Drones and driverless tractors – is this the future of farming?

The Guardian ^ | 20 July 2015 | Peter Moore

[2ndDivisionVet]

Tractors and combines were GPS guided back in the 90’s.

[TigerLikesRooster]

[Liberty Valance]

Farmer John - Roomful Of Blues

[redfreedom]

I still prefer your Ford over this GPS stuff.

Personally, I’m a JD 2 cylinder fan. That slow running pop pop pop in the distance of a someone doing summer fallow is just as clear today as when I heard it as a kid. I own a industrial version, the JD440 made in 58. It’s still in use.

[cuban leaf]

Drones and driverless tractors – is this the future of farming?

---

I have a son-in-law in South Dakota that farms 6,000 acres of soy and corn. I can confirm that based on the equipment he had ten years ago, the answer to the title is clearly “yes” as sure as the Model T exposed the future of personal transportation.

Way back then the operator of large equipment was little more than a passenger as it made its way through the fields, planting, fertilizing and harvesting.

And battery tech is exploding right now. Drones of ten years from now, compared to modern drones, will be like Mustangs compared to Model T’s.

[wally_bert]

I am a Massey Ferguson type myself.

Dad and an uncle still have quite a few operational.

Here are three of them from a few years back in the T2i days.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSouzl1erxo

[TigerLikesRooster]

These farming robots and drones could be easier to implement than self-driving cars. They operate on wide-open flat field and in wide-open sky. Much friendlier environment than roads, where a car has to navigate around other cars, pedestrians, and dogs jumping into the road.

[cuban leaf]

Exactly. Already the “driver” is a bit like the engineer in the cockpit of commercial jetliners in the years before the law was changed to no longer require their presence.

[WKUHilltopper]

So will this mean we’ll be offering citizen, voting cards and free college tuition to illegal immigrant drones?

[cuban leaf]

Me:

[T-Bird45]

Looks like you could use some weights up front, that 2-bottom cutting heavy unbroken soil seems to have the front-end running a little light. Great shot!

[TigerLikesRooster]

illegal immigrant drones

Legally born(manufactured) in a U.S. factory, programmed to vote "Conservative"(RINO won't count.) :-)

[TigerLikesRooster]

Nice pic. working at yours or your son-in-law’s?

[cuban leaf]

Mine. It was when I first cut the garden. To be honest, The two things I use that tractor for now are grading my 1/4 mile driveway (with a steep grade in the first 100 yards) and bush-hogging.

[cuban leaf]

The small diameter of the back tires is what causes that look. Notice all the air space between the tires and the fenders.

[chrisser]

Here's me and my old, sorta rebuilt, International B414.



Robot bush hog would be nice. Wonder how it would handle the rocks we tend to grow. Maybe better than the current operator.

Rather than a robot, I wouldn't mind a radar-based rock detector. Maybe I could modify a fish finder or something...

Although I have to say, I'm generally happiest when I'm on my tractor. Not sure I'd want to offload that to a robot.

[Tucker39]

That’s a Ferguson tractor. Initially appeared in Scotland and the British Isles. Henry Ford liked the mounted plows and other implements so much that he bought the rights to pattern his own start-up line of tractors and implements after the “Ferguson System” as it was called. Over the past 75 years, Ford farm machinery has gone through several iterations, ending up renamed Ford-New Holland, and now strictly New Holland.

[varyouga]

“Exactly. Already the “driver” is a bit like the engineer in the cockpit of commercial jetliners in the years before the law was changed to no longer require their presence.”

And their presence will likely always be required when lives are at stake. Unless we are stupid enough to introduce true artificial intelligence into the wild.

A machine that can’t truly “think” cannot compensate for every new scenario.

You can minimize the scenarios by having “closed” systems though. Things like farms, monorails and closed sections of highway will become 100% driver-less.

But buses on the open road and planes in the open sky will likely have human supervision unless true AI comes.

[minnesota_bound]

Go ahead and let your expensive equipment roam about on the farm all by itself. What could go wrong?

Prices
http://www.equipmenttraderonline.com/Farming-Equipment/John-Deere-Tractors-For-Sale/search-results?make=John+deere|2322580&category=Tractors|2001881