Posted on 03/22/2017 1:08:15 PM PDT by Rebelbase
To avoid the draconian locks that John Deere puts on the tractors they buy, farmers throughout America's heartland have started hacking their equipment with firmware that's cracked in Eastern Europe and traded on invite-only, paid online forums.
Tractor hacking is growing increasingly popular because John Deere and other manufacturers have made it impossible to perform "unauthorized" repair on farm equipment, which farmers see as an attack on their sovereignty and quite possibly an existential threat to their livelihood if their tractor breaks at an inopportune time.
"When crunch time comes and we break down, chances are we don't have time to wait for a dealership employee to show up and fix it," Danny Kluthe, a hog farmer in Nebraska, told his state legislature earlier this month. "Most all the new equipment [requires] a download [to fix]."
(Excerpt) Read more at motherboard.vice.com ...
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Vanguard Total Stock Mkt Idx 6,541,327 2.06 80,851 1.25 0.13 02/28/2017
Franklin Income A 5,964,691 1.87 -2,535,309 -29.83 0.76 12/31/2016
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VA CollegeAmerica Fundamental Invs 529E 3,000,000 0.94 0 0 0.40 12/31/2016
Industrial Select Sector SPDR® ETF 1,660,254 0.52 15,500 0.94 1.69 03/21/2017
Fidelity Spartan® 500 Index Inv 1,635,433 0.51 3,892 0.24 0.16 01/31/2017
VA CollegeAmerica Amercn Bal 529E 1,600,000 0.50 0 0 0.17 12/31/2016
Vanguard Value Index Inv 1,475,844 0.46 36,285 2.52 0.29 02/28/2017
Loomis Sayles Growth Y 1,201,424 0.38 13,275 1.12 2.60 01/31/2017
Principal Equity Income A 1,068,944 0.34 -28,142 -2.57 1.94 01/31/2017
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Explains why you never see any big tractors mowing down zombies in the apocalyptic TV and Movie shows.
When I was there Koreans had even smaller tractors to work the rice fields. Bet that’s not true anymore.
Programmable ECU tuning has bee around on cars for a long time, I’m way past college age and have a Cobb unit on my Subaru turbo, five settings from no boost to requiring racing gas, just set back to factory and remove the module when warranty work rolls around.
Yup, AC were the best tractors made. I had a old WD-45 that would pull a 3 bottom plow through cement.
Trying to fix it yourself invalidates any warranties.
One technicality in this set-up is that these implements have become so expensive that many farmers literally NEVER actually OWN these things any more. They lease them. The lease contract probably contains stipulations that ALL repairs MUST be done by a qualified technician from the implement company, which the lessee signs. This is not your old “H” or “M” Farmall any more.
Mercedes Sprinter cultist’s have ways to screw around with the ECM to induce desired change
They do not have the right to this.
Ukraine has hackers? Maybe they hacked the election. But for the wrong candidate.
“College kids do this to their cars to enhance performance.”
These days you can buy off the shelf “tunes” for anything from a $20k VW GTI to a $160 Audi R8. It’s big business.
While on leave in Japan in 1960, travelling by train from Hokkaido to Kyushu and back, I saw scenes like this. But the little tractorette being used was a certain shade of orange. Who could have foreseen at that time, what would become of Kubota?
THAT is some Bull$h!t right there.
It doesn't take long for the cancer of Communism/Fascism to spread completely to the crony capitalist monopolies, and used-to-be Communist Soviet states are leading the fight for freedom and property rights.
Who woulda thunk it?
bookmark
“Yup, AC were the best tractors made.”
There used to be a lot of brand loyalty between farmers and their tractors. Think International Harvester, Case, Oliver, Massey Ferguson, Minneapolis Moline, and Ford.
No more. Tractors became just another product line for the MBAs.
I drive a Cub Cadet from the early 80’s. It has the IH badge.
Advise to Case International. Allow farmers to wrench on their own equipment and put JD ag out of business overnight.
These new smartasses at John Deere are destroying all the loyalty the company has built over the last century. I know a lot of guys who are true John Deere loyalists. They grew up with Deere tractors, have never owned anything but a Deere tractor, hell, they just about bleed John Deere green if you cut them. They have little models of John Deere tractors all over their homes and John Deere books on their shelves. My best friend owns seven John Deere tractors, one of them from the 1930s.
Something has happened. The people calling the shots now at John Deere don’t seem to give a damn about any of that. They want as much money as they can get right now and everything else can go hang. They’re actually willing to cause financial harm to their customers if it will put another hundred dollars in their pocket. “Oh, you can pay us $130,000 for a tractor but, guess what? As far as we’re concerned you will never actually own it! What’s that? Your starter has gone out? Pay us to come fix it. Or sit there and watch your crop rot. Either way is fine with us.”
John Deere has been infected and if it doesn’t get cured it will end up as just another company that went the way of the dodo.
It may be more simply said that actually done, but don’t but John Deere equipment.
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