1gr8bldr
Senior Member
Tractorbynet forum had a recent post where one of the guys invested his time in compiling the post of a wise turn plow gentleman who no longer post. His wisdom of farm equipment was well known to the forum. I will edit in a link to the compilation. [.http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/attachments/308006-moldboard-plow-wisdom-farmwithjunk.html] I had read these post over the years but was not able to apply the knowledge until I experimented for myself. This is a post where I responded, having some time invested in it, I thought I would share it here. Most of it I have said here at Woodys, but this has it all in one post
e: MOLDBOARD PLOW WISDOM FROM FARMWITHJUNK
What I have learned about this... by trial and error. I had read these post by Farmwithjunk over the years, but was unable to utilize the info until having tried and failed at plowing. Through trial and error I figured it out, and once understanding by experience, I look back at his post and see that it was there all along. So I will explain some of my trial and error. Originally before I sought instruction on the net, I just made a mess with the plow. Mine being a dbl 16 pulled by a Super Dexta. It pulled bad to the right, it came in and out of the ground, and I could not keep the rows straight. I could not maintain, replacing the furrowed dirt consistently with the next roll. Which means I was creating a mess. A field that needs to be fixed with a drag hare to fill in and level out the mess. What a mess. And if you wait till later to disc, if the ground gets hard, you will create a situation where your tractor work will be like riding a bull. If you do make a mess, fix it now while the dirt is soft enough for the tires to sink into the humps. I used to and see on the internet many people using the turn plow as a plow, like dragging a hoe. This causes buildup on the moulboard. If you see 100 % of the moulboard plow nice and shinny, your usually in the zone. If not, then you dragging like a hoe instead of rolling. I once played with adjustments until I got lucky and it began to do well. I took pics of a tape measure measuring distances of adjustment so I could always get back in the zone. Plow did great that year. I was able to make short work of my grown up food plots. Turning over one pass, disc one pass, seed and disc in lightly with the disc gangs adjusted to hardly any angle. But this year, I adjusted everything back the way it showed in the pics and ... it would not work as it should. So I decided I needed to understand a plow setup. I had some time on my hands to experiment. In the past, I had put it up on blocks, but I did not realize exactly what to look for. A 12 inch plow needs 6 in blocks, a 14 in plow needs a 7in block and a 16 in plow needs 8 inch blocks. The blocks being half the plow width. Why, because the plow as Farmwithjunk said is designed to work at half the depth of the width and by jacking the left side [while seated on the tractor], you mimic the tractor in the furrow as it is doing the work. I blocked it up as stated and looked at the plow. It seemed like it should work with the adjustments from the previous year. But I noticed that with my quick hitch, I had so much movement that the plow could torqe under pressure. So I tightened everything up to stop much of the sway. Now that my plow is adjusted properly, it can be loose but stopping the sway helps to visualize the goal of the setting. Knowing this visual goal rather than trying to get lucky will eliminate the trial and error of adjusting. It will also help you determine when the points are in need of replacing. If it is set right and does not do well... then it is time to renew the points. Mine are surprisingly worn and still cutting great. So, once on blocks, raise and lower the plow with the lift, lowering slowly and observing how the points are approaching the ground. Adjust the left and right and the center linkage until the Entire cutting edges of the points/shares touch the ground at the same exact time. LOL, my tractor leaks down slowly so I can get it close and get on my knees and watch it sink. It is best to do this on level concrete. Once you get it real close, a trial run may be in order. Not to see how it cuts or turns but rather how it pulls. I think of a farmer that often turns a small amount of acreage that I lease to him... He plows going sideways, tractor pulling right. You should be able to adjust this out. This will be accomplished with the 2 lift points on the plow. Farmwithjunk says to adjust the tractor to fit the plow. Respectfully, most will never do this. So adjust the plow to the tractor. We are now not talking about the points cutting or adjustment but rather the direction of the plow in relation to the tractor. If you notice, the lift points on the plow will be different heights. Most all plows have some sort of adjustment here. The 101's are great because they have a lever arm that you can quickly experiment with. I learned the hard way with a plow that was not easily adjusted. Do not adjust anything on the tractor here. Only the plow lift arms. This by rotating the lift arm oblonged points. This rotation causes the plow beams or direction of plow to turn in relation to the tractor direction. I have read much giving measurments, pulling strings, etc. But I will say that through experience, trying all combinations, for learning purposes, my tractor has a sweet spot. If rotated too far one way it pulled hard. If rotated to far the opposite, it pulled terribly to the right. The goal was to try all combinations until I could turn loose of the steering wheel and it go straight in the furrow with no help from me. I found that I need to keep a hand on the wheel to steer but not to hold it, or fight it as I once did. If you had a 101, I would say spend 10 minutes experimenting, to see what works best. As for my tractor, I will tell you where the sweet spot was. If you took a straight line, I used a 20 ft 2x6 and touched the inside of the front wheel and the inside of the back wheel with the remainder out the rear next to the plow, the beams of the plow ran parallel to this line. This however is not the centerline direction of the tractor. Why, because the rear tires are bigger than the fronts. Most tractors can be adjusted for wheel widths so this will not work with every tractor... but this mimics the line of the furrow. I tried pointing the plow beams in the direction of the center line of the tractor. It pulled right way to much. Once this "plow direction" [in relation to the tractor] was determined, verified by being able to plow a straight line with no hand on the wheel, we go back to the linkage adjustments for fine tuning. The initial set up was to get close enough for a direction setup procedure. Now redo you "touching" the ground by watching the plow touch the concrete. Farmwithjunk says to level the plow, of which I did not understand. If your entire cutting edge of the points/shares touch the ground the same on the fall, it will likely be level. Keep adjusting the linkage until the entire length of the points touch at the exact time while falling to the level concrete. It does not have to be perfectly level as long as it is on the same plane as the tractor and is flat. Don't be tempted to say "that's close enough". You want the sweet spot, you have jacked it up and gone this far. Work to get it perfect. Once you know the mechanics behind the sweet spot, and can visualize the goal of the settings, you should be able to set up your plow within 10 minutes even though you have lost your adjustments due to using other implements. When your plow has been set up properly, it becomes an engineering marvel. My neck hurts from watching it turn. The turn plow more than any other implement I can think of is so satisfying to watch it do it's work. With the proper setting, it cuts like butter. My Super Dexta idles as it does the work. It no longer works me or the tractor. And the best part is that the rolls are consistent, doing perfect work. You may find that your, for example, dbl 16, cutting 32 inches is only cutting 30 inches, meaning that your overlapping your cut. This is fixed by moving your lift connections of the plow farther left but careful to maintain your present setting of direction. After this change, you should likely recheck your setup. So, with the plow going in the ground well, rolling well with no green showing, steering easy, your cutting effortlessly, traction is your only concern. Water in the front and rear tires give you the weight for traction as well as momentum. This is where "draft" control is the next engineering marvel. The center link of most tractors goes into the back of the hydraulic system and acts as a plunger to operate the lift just as you would manually. When presure is applied to that link, it pushes inward and raises the lift according to how you have it set for speed of lift and pressure needed to cause that lift. Too fast and the plow comes out of the ground, to slow and it may not respond quick enough to do any good according to the speed you are working. I got lucky, my "speed of lift" seems to be perfect so I have not played with that setting. Mine being a knob that I screw in or out. As far as pressure to respond setting, I should explain in novice terms how this actually works first. If you begin to loose traction, the tractor actually lowers slightly due to the removing of dirt under the wheel. The plow stayed at the same height. This then has raised the back of the plow in relation of the tractor only, pushing in on the top link, resulting in the draft telling it to lift. Hitting something does the same thing. Or harder ground presure will do the same. My Super Dexta has a big spring at the rear of the hydraulics that I can change the pressure needed to make the lift respond. This is the main setting for this. For in the field setting going from one need to another such as a subsoiler to a turn plow, you can attach the top link with one of three holes by a pin which changes the pressure needed due to a leverage advantage of one hole over the other. As Farmwithjunk has said, you should consider going with the manufactures direction, if you can find such. But trial and error will tell whats best. Note that many older tractors have a broken top hole of this setting. Apparently because the force of being in the top hole breaks them. But for me, the upper hole is perfect for subsoiling and the middle for turn plowing. It is great to get it set right. You can feel it working as if someone is bumping your tractor as you ride. If you are using your hand to manually help out with lifting the plow when traction is needed, then your not in the zone. It is great when it works perfect. It takes a little experience but it is worth it and quite satisfying to know you figured it out, making the most of your tractors engineering. Many plows come with a sort of trip. Either a cam type trip with springs or a shear pin... or both as mine has. Likely these old plows are not clean enough to trip as they should. I make mine trip each season by pulling the pin and pulling by hand on the cam until it trips. Knowing that it is not froze up gives the security of knowing it will work in the event that I hit something. Hitting something can bend you top brace of the plow, damage points or get you hurt when you come out of your seat on impact. Make shure if yours does not trip, that you take it apart and clean it up. Use a grease that does not attract dust and don't use much. Don't be tempted to use stronger shear bolts. Adjust your trips to work properly. As far as when to plow, there is a best time, but if your like me, you do so when you take the notion. Moisture in the ground helps for those hardest areas that you have given up on. I have found it best not to bush hog before plowing. Horizontal thatch will build up on your plow dragging along rather than being turned in. If you need to bush hog due to the height, consider cutting with 12 inches left standing to reduce the horizontal thatch. 12 inches vertical will disappear with my dbl 16. Horizontal thatch is the only thing that will hinder a well set up plow. I hope that my explanation of what does not work helps you to understand Farmwithjunks wisdom in his post. I am sure I left something out, and may follow up as I realize it
e: MOLDBOARD PLOW WISDOM FROM FARMWITHJUNK
What I have learned about this... by trial and error. I had read these post by Farmwithjunk over the years, but was unable to utilize the info until having tried and failed at plowing. Through trial and error I figured it out, and once understanding by experience, I look back at his post and see that it was there all along. So I will explain some of my trial and error. Originally before I sought instruction on the net, I just made a mess with the plow. Mine being a dbl 16 pulled by a Super Dexta. It pulled bad to the right, it came in and out of the ground, and I could not keep the rows straight. I could not maintain, replacing the furrowed dirt consistently with the next roll. Which means I was creating a mess. A field that needs to be fixed with a drag hare to fill in and level out the mess. What a mess. And if you wait till later to disc, if the ground gets hard, you will create a situation where your tractor work will be like riding a bull. If you do make a mess, fix it now while the dirt is soft enough for the tires to sink into the humps. I used to and see on the internet many people using the turn plow as a plow, like dragging a hoe. This causes buildup on the moulboard. If you see 100 % of the moulboard plow nice and shinny, your usually in the zone. If not, then you dragging like a hoe instead of rolling. I once played with adjustments until I got lucky and it began to do well. I took pics of a tape measure measuring distances of adjustment so I could always get back in the zone. Plow did great that year. I was able to make short work of my grown up food plots. Turning over one pass, disc one pass, seed and disc in lightly with the disc gangs adjusted to hardly any angle. But this year, I adjusted everything back the way it showed in the pics and ... it would not work as it should. So I decided I needed to understand a plow setup. I had some time on my hands to experiment. In the past, I had put it up on blocks, but I did not realize exactly what to look for. A 12 inch plow needs 6 in blocks, a 14 in plow needs a 7in block and a 16 in plow needs 8 inch blocks. The blocks being half the plow width. Why, because the plow as Farmwithjunk said is designed to work at half the depth of the width and by jacking the left side [while seated on the tractor], you mimic the tractor in the furrow as it is doing the work. I blocked it up as stated and looked at the plow. It seemed like it should work with the adjustments from the previous year. But I noticed that with my quick hitch, I had so much movement that the plow could torqe under pressure. So I tightened everything up to stop much of the sway. Now that my plow is adjusted properly, it can be loose but stopping the sway helps to visualize the goal of the setting. Knowing this visual goal rather than trying to get lucky will eliminate the trial and error of adjusting. It will also help you determine when the points are in need of replacing. If it is set right and does not do well... then it is time to renew the points. Mine are surprisingly worn and still cutting great. So, once on blocks, raise and lower the plow with the lift, lowering slowly and observing how the points are approaching the ground. Adjust the left and right and the center linkage until the Entire cutting edges of the points/shares touch the ground at the same exact time. LOL, my tractor leaks down slowly so I can get it close and get on my knees and watch it sink. It is best to do this on level concrete. Once you get it real close, a trial run may be in order. Not to see how it cuts or turns but rather how it pulls. I think of a farmer that often turns a small amount of acreage that I lease to him... He plows going sideways, tractor pulling right. You should be able to adjust this out. This will be accomplished with the 2 lift points on the plow. Farmwithjunk says to adjust the tractor to fit the plow. Respectfully, most will never do this. So adjust the plow to the tractor. We are now not talking about the points cutting or adjustment but rather the direction of the plow in relation to the tractor. If you notice, the lift points on the plow will be different heights. Most all plows have some sort of adjustment here. The 101's are great because they have a lever arm that you can quickly experiment with. I learned the hard way with a plow that was not easily adjusted. Do not adjust anything on the tractor here. Only the plow lift arms. This by rotating the lift arm oblonged points. This rotation causes the plow beams or direction of plow to turn in relation to the tractor direction. I have read much giving measurments, pulling strings, etc. But I will say that through experience, trying all combinations, for learning purposes, my tractor has a sweet spot. If rotated too far one way it pulled hard. If rotated to far the opposite, it pulled terribly to the right. The goal was to try all combinations until I could turn loose of the steering wheel and it go straight in the furrow with no help from me. I found that I need to keep a hand on the wheel to steer but not to hold it, or fight it as I once did. If you had a 101, I would say spend 10 minutes experimenting, to see what works best. As for my tractor, I will tell you where the sweet spot was. If you took a straight line, I used a 20 ft 2x6 and touched the inside of the front wheel and the inside of the back wheel with the remainder out the rear next to the plow, the beams of the plow ran parallel to this line. This however is not the centerline direction of the tractor. Why, because the rear tires are bigger than the fronts. Most tractors can be adjusted for wheel widths so this will not work with every tractor... but this mimics the line of the furrow. I tried pointing the plow beams in the direction of the center line of the tractor. It pulled right way to much. Once this "plow direction" [in relation to the tractor] was determined, verified by being able to plow a straight line with no hand on the wheel, we go back to the linkage adjustments for fine tuning. The initial set up was to get close enough for a direction setup procedure. Now redo you "touching" the ground by watching the plow touch the concrete. Farmwithjunk says to level the plow, of which I did not understand. If your entire cutting edge of the points/shares touch the ground the same on the fall, it will likely be level. Keep adjusting the linkage until the entire length of the points touch at the exact time while falling to the level concrete. It does not have to be perfectly level as long as it is on the same plane as the tractor and is flat. Don't be tempted to say "that's close enough". You want the sweet spot, you have jacked it up and gone this far. Work to get it perfect. Once you know the mechanics behind the sweet spot, and can visualize the goal of the settings, you should be able to set up your plow within 10 minutes even though you have lost your adjustments due to using other implements. When your plow has been set up properly, it becomes an engineering marvel. My neck hurts from watching it turn. The turn plow more than any other implement I can think of is so satisfying to watch it do it's work. With the proper setting, it cuts like butter. My Super Dexta idles as it does the work. It no longer works me or the tractor. And the best part is that the rolls are consistent, doing perfect work. You may find that your, for example, dbl 16, cutting 32 inches is only cutting 30 inches, meaning that your overlapping your cut. This is fixed by moving your lift connections of the plow farther left but careful to maintain your present setting of direction. After this change, you should likely recheck your setup. So, with the plow going in the ground well, rolling well with no green showing, steering easy, your cutting effortlessly, traction is your only concern. Water in the front and rear tires give you the weight for traction as well as momentum. This is where "draft" control is the next engineering marvel. The center link of most tractors goes into the back of the hydraulic system and acts as a plunger to operate the lift just as you would manually. When presure is applied to that link, it pushes inward and raises the lift according to how you have it set for speed of lift and pressure needed to cause that lift. Too fast and the plow comes out of the ground, to slow and it may not respond quick enough to do any good according to the speed you are working. I got lucky, my "speed of lift" seems to be perfect so I have not played with that setting. Mine being a knob that I screw in or out. As far as pressure to respond setting, I should explain in novice terms how this actually works first. If you begin to loose traction, the tractor actually lowers slightly due to the removing of dirt under the wheel. The plow stayed at the same height. This then has raised the back of the plow in relation of the tractor only, pushing in on the top link, resulting in the draft telling it to lift. Hitting something does the same thing. Or harder ground presure will do the same. My Super Dexta has a big spring at the rear of the hydraulics that I can change the pressure needed to make the lift respond. This is the main setting for this. For in the field setting going from one need to another such as a subsoiler to a turn plow, you can attach the top link with one of three holes by a pin which changes the pressure needed due to a leverage advantage of one hole over the other. As Farmwithjunk has said, you should consider going with the manufactures direction, if you can find such. But trial and error will tell whats best. Note that many older tractors have a broken top hole of this setting. Apparently because the force of being in the top hole breaks them. But for me, the upper hole is perfect for subsoiling and the middle for turn plowing. It is great to get it set right. You can feel it working as if someone is bumping your tractor as you ride. If you are using your hand to manually help out with lifting the plow when traction is needed, then your not in the zone. It is great when it works perfect. It takes a little experience but it is worth it and quite satisfying to know you figured it out, making the most of your tractors engineering. Many plows come with a sort of trip. Either a cam type trip with springs or a shear pin... or both as mine has. Likely these old plows are not clean enough to trip as they should. I make mine trip each season by pulling the pin and pulling by hand on the cam until it trips. Knowing that it is not froze up gives the security of knowing it will work in the event that I hit something. Hitting something can bend you top brace of the plow, damage points or get you hurt when you come out of your seat on impact. Make shure if yours does not trip, that you take it apart and clean it up. Use a grease that does not attract dust and don't use much. Don't be tempted to use stronger shear bolts. Adjust your trips to work properly. As far as when to plow, there is a best time, but if your like me, you do so when you take the notion. Moisture in the ground helps for those hardest areas that you have given up on. I have found it best not to bush hog before plowing. Horizontal thatch will build up on your plow dragging along rather than being turned in. If you need to bush hog due to the height, consider cutting with 12 inches left standing to reduce the horizontal thatch. 12 inches vertical will disappear with my dbl 16. Horizontal thatch is the only thing that will hinder a well set up plow. I hope that my explanation of what does not work helps you to understand Farmwithjunks wisdom in his post. I am sure I left something out, and may follow up as I realize it
