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| We had a 16 row Kinze 2600 for 10 years and only had one place where we had to go through a rocked creek bottom that was pretty steep up and down both sides that it got close to dragging the tail. Cliff's idea would not be hard to do and I can see where it would help keep the tail end up.
That said I don't want to start a color war, but I would SERIOUSLY look at a 1790 Deere if you can find one with CCS. We've got a 1770 because we're just 30" rows, but nothing on that planter is wider than the duals on the tractor plus or minus an inch maybe. This is the first green planter we've had since the 494A days, but the big advantage to them is the CCS hoppers. Until you run one you won't believe how big an advantage it is to carry that much seed with you and not have to stop as often. It makes a huge difference in productivity.
Don't know how you farm, but for us we have a lot of smaller fields and being able to load up and go plant 90 to 100 acres in a fill means you don't have to shuffle the seed wagon all over and that saves you even more time unless you've got someone who just runs it during planting season. The Deere planter is also much more stable on the road if it's not a smooth highway. The Kinze will bounce and rock front to back, the Deere has a lot of weight on the tongue and rides a lot better down the road if you road it a lot.
Either planter will plant and do a good job. Compared to our 2600 the JD pro units are much heavier and the press wheel brackets are cast and multiple times stronger than the press steel of the Kinze. The down side to the Kinze is the time it takes to adjust down pressure vs the pneumatic on the Deere and the individual boxes on the older Kinze's left a gallon of seed in every box if you switch varieties often and want to have a clean switch to compare. It's also a pain when you get done because you have several bags of seed left. I think the newer Kinze boxes have solved this problem, but most of the 2600's will be the old style.
Do one thing before you buy, take time to go look at a 1790 in person. I think you will be surprised. In our case we really didn't think we wanted one, but felt we owed it to our salesman to at least give him a shot. Once we saw it in person we were really glad we did. That's coming from someone who has never run a lot of green before too.
Good Luck,
Ray | |
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A few questions about the kinze planters
