Tiller 3pt tiller usage/effectiveness

[dlauffenburger]

I see a lot of post/advertisements for 3pt tillers, but i was under the impression that they were primarily for light duty garden use. I am not familiar with tillers so please bear with me for a few questions.


We plant approx. 15 acres of corn and oats and i am curious if the new tillers would cut down on fuel and time required to prepare the fields. Currently we plow, disc, and then drag the fields which ends up requiring going over the fields 3 to 6 times. If the new tillers are capable of this much use i would think that even if you have to go slower, one time through the field would still end up being faster and cheaper.

Are the new tillers capable of being used for larger tracts of ground?
Has anyone used a tiller for this much acerage? If so how was the experience?
How well do the tillers hold up?
Obviously fields will have more rocks than a garden, so how do the tillers
handle rocks?

Any info and recommendations will be appreciated.

Dave

 

[MESSMAKER]

A tiller might work but I suspect it would end up being slower. You would need a couple of passes and tilling is usually done at a very slow speed.
this does not factor the wear and tear on a tiller.

 

[foggy1111]

I think you will find there are many operations that till 15 or (many) more acres of land. I use a five foot tiller and can till an acre in about 2 hours. One pass is all thats needed. With a forward rotation tiller, the tiller usuallly just walks over rocks (but I do not till in an excessive rock condition).

You dont say what size tractor you have (HP) or size tiller contemplated....or type of soils you are working....or where your located. So answers here are lots of guesswork.

 

[jenkinsph]

My experience is that tillers are slightly slower than using plows and disks but provide a more uniform seedbed. Good quality tillers with high quality tines seem to hold up to rocks very well. Typically I can till with my tractor about 1.5 to 2.0 mph and get good results equivalent to making 3 or 4 passes with a disk. If you compare this to pulling the disk at 6 mph you can see it works out about the same, but you did pay to drive the tractor across the field several times with the disk or plows.

Good disks, plows and tillers all carry a hefty price tag and each of them has their own benefits. I move my equipment around alot in my work so a tiller is much more compact to transport and works well for me. The tiller works better in close quarters work too, since you can backup to a fence or building and start tilling full depth, a disk and plow need to be pulled for a distance to obtain the proper set. Tillers are available from small models for 20 hp tractors to several hundred hp and 16' widths.

A good pull type disk works well and will do a better job of leveling and smoothing out the ground if you have the room to operate it. Most farmers who till use this method and it works well for large areas. When used with chisel plows and finishing tools depending on the soil you can get very good results.

I work small areas primarily and use a combination of tillers, landplane/grader with straight blades and harrows all set up for 3PH work. For you it would be a different set of circumstances, depending on the equipment you already have you might be better off upgrading the weakest link to get better results with your time.

 

[Fixemall]

I use my tiller for a 3 acre plot and one pass gets it done. If going this route, buy a high quality unit with a pto clutch pack. Mine is a DelMarino HF 204 and has served me well behind my 45hp diesel. This thread reminds me that I have to service it soon as I have another field to prep this fall for trees.

 

[ModMech]

We used the tractor and tiller in my sig line for about an acre of grassland prep to try growning a boutique grass. While the bedding was PERFECT on the first pass, there was some significant lack of mental focus on the seeding and we did not get the expected results.

It really did not take long and based on what locals tell me, if we had used a plow/disc setup it would have required a minimum of two passes and most likely three. A larger tractor could have done it in 1 or 2 however, we just cannot get enough traction with ours for "real" ground engaging field work. It is not an issue of HP, but one of weight.

 

[jenkinsph]

Thought I would add as a reference that I can till about 1 to 1 1/4 acres per hour with my 4520 and 673 tiller. In my locale I have no problem averaging 1 acre/hour with only one pass needed. This is tilling about 7" depth leaving a good smooth finish. So in two days I can easily till and harrow smooth 15 acres ready for seed.

 

[Botabill]

I just bought a 60 inch PTO tiller for my tractor after many years of making do with a walk behind. Frankly I still think a plow, disk, harrows and cultivator is a better way to cultivate the soil as you can develop better tilth (less pulverized soil) If you want to rapidly create a seed bed a tiller is wonderful. Gardening/farming is an art and there are many way to go depending on what you want to achieve.

 

[Combustix]

Okay what is the difference between tilling and cultivating.

 

[sawduster98]

My neighbor has one of those 16' tillers and tills 2 plots of about 15 acres each. Runs it off a big JD. It's an impressive piece of gear and built like a tank. He moves right along with it too.

 

[flusher]

I see a lot of post/advertisements for 3pt tillers, but i was under the impression that they were primarily for light duty garden use. I am not familiar with tillers so please bear with me for a few questions.


We plant approx. 15 acres of corn and oats and i am curious if the new tillers would cut down on fuel and time required to prepare the fields. Currently we plow, disc, and then drag the fields which ends up requiring going over the fields 3 to 6 times. If the new tillers are capable of this much use i would think that even if you have to go slower, one time through the field would still end up being faster and cheaper.

Are the new tillers capable of being used for larger tracts of ground?
Has anyone used a tiller for this much acerage? If so how was the experience?
How well do the tillers hold up?
Obviously fields will have more rocks than a garden, so how do the tillers
handle rocks?

Any info and recommendations will be appreciated.

Dave

Tilling breaks down the soil's microstructure (too much pulverization) which is not beneficial. One pass with an offset disc set aggressively with some sort of drag attached to the disc gets the cultivation job done. I use this method to plant about 6 acres of Kanota oats on my little hayfield (gravely loam soil). One pass to cultivate, one pass with the 10-ft grain drill gets the planting chore done.

 

[LeadPoison]

I have been having a similar situation as well. I plant about 8 acres of food plots every year. I have been discing all these years. I have grown tired of passing over the fields three times one week and another three times another week. I was wondering if one pass with the tiller would do the trick. All I plant is oats and wheat for the deer. I can easily run a 6 or 7 foot tiller on my Kubota M4900.

 

[2458n]

Used a 1650 Oliver and a heavy 6ft Howard tiller to do several hay fields. Worked well. Spoke with a man who used his Howard to till up Christmas tree stumps. Was not much worried on my dirt.

 

[Botabill]

Okay what is the difference between tilling and cultivating.

To me when you use a rototiller you are tilling. Cultivating is a broader term which can include the use of many different impliments; plows, cultivators, harrows,discs etc., to break up the soil to varying degrees. A tiller, broadly speaking could also be considered cultivating the soil.

 

[ModMech]

I have been having a similar situation as well. I plant about 8 acres of food plots every year. I have been discing all these years. I have grown tired of passing over the fields three times one week and another three times another week. I was wondering if one pass with the tiller would do the trick. All I plant is oats and wheat for the deer. I can easily run a 6 or 7 foot tiller on my Kubota M4900.

We are successful using one pass with the tiller, as long as there are no stalks in the mix. If there are, we either pluch them out afterwards (a few) or need to before (many) so we get good results.

 

[radioman]

Okay what is the difference between tilling and cultivating.

you guys will laugh at this- the way I see it is cultivating is flipping the soil with a pancake turner to smother vegatation and smooth out small bumps. Tilling is using a blender to churn the dirt till its all blended out and into fine peices.

Now I am hungry. BRB!! :laughing:

 

[Qapla]

OK what is the difference between tilling and cultivating.

Around here most people use tilling, plowing or disking as something that is done before planting to prepare the ground for planting.

Cultivating is done after planting between rows to remove weeds/grass and keep the soil ready to receive water, fertilizer, etc.

 

[jonyyuma]

radioman, about right...Pulverize the soil with a tiller. It sure makes the rain easy to soak up into the garden...I traded hours of Cultivating for Tilling, but it make cost me in wear on the blades? Time will tell the tale, but i grin anytime I need to use the hoe on weeds..

 

[dlauffenburger]

I think you will find there are many operations that till 15 or (many) more acres of land. I use a five foot tiller and can till an acre in about 2 hours. One pass is all thats needed. With a forward rotation tiller, the tiller usuallly just walks over rocks (but I do not till in an excessive rock condition).

You dont say what size tractor you have (HP) or size tiller contemplated....or type of soils you are working....or where your located. So answers here are lots of guesswork.

Foggy1111,

Thank You for the info. I originally did not provide any particluars to our situation because i was just wondering outloud.

Our current tractors are a Case 1070 (107 HP) and a Farmall Super M but i am looking at trading off the Super M for a LS 5030 or some other 50-60 HP 4WD tractor, as we get older the Super M is just to much work to operate (NO PS, 3PT, etc).
We are located in the Alleghany Mountains of NW Pennsylvania, so the soil is a clay based soil. We try to clear the rocks out of the fields as we find them but the rocks seem to grow as fast as the crops so we continually find new ones.

Your comment about "Forward Rotation" tillers was a surprise, I thought all tillers rotated aft and threw the work soil out the back of the machine. What tillers use a forward rotation and what would be your recommendations.

Thanks again for your reply.

David

 

[dlauffenburger]

Tilling breaks down the soil's microstructure (too much pulverization) which is not beneficial. One pass with an offset disc set aggressively with some sort of drag attached to the disc gets the cultivation job done. I use this method to plant about 6 acres of Kanota oats on my little hayfield (gravely loam soil). One pass to cultivate, one pass with the 10-ft grain drill gets the planting chore done.

Flusher,

Thanks for your reply and the attatchments. From the sounds of your reply you replant the same fields every year so the aggresive disc break up the soil for you. We rotate our crop fields with hay fields so they only get plowed for crops every 4 or 5 years, so using discs only is not an option, after 4 years of hay the fields need to be plowed in order to prepare for crops.

Thanks again for your reply.
David