Replaced my RK seed tube guards that were installed in 2015 with Exapta Valions.

The RK products were very good and I had intended on replacing them with RK's again but since the buyout I felt they were simply too expensive compared to the cost of the Exapta's.

I'm still very impressed with the RK gauge wheel solutions. Even after replacing and re-shimming 3.5 mm opener discs they required very little adjustment when reinstalling.

I thought I would post about the rivet drilling out and re-installing as that was my main area of concern in not damaging the sheet metal shank of the ME II planter unit.

The RK and Exapta seed tube guards both use nearly identical rivet/bolt/bushing setups to transfer the wear to the bushings and guard instead of into the sheet metal sides as the original roll pin setup did.  Exapta only uses a single bolt to hold the wings to protect the seed tube while the RK uses 2. Both products offer the larger ID bushings and hardware if your holes in the sheet metal sides have already been drilled out to the larger size due to excessive wear.

The 7200 requires a rivet in the front hole for clearance issues. The rivet on the RK models when finished left a dimple in the center which made it easy to drill out.

There is limited space to work so I used a right angle drill and used a small bit to start in the center dimple. You are essentially drilling out the hollow end of the rivet that gets rounded over. Once the hole is started I moved to a larger bit that was approximately the same size as the rounded over end of the rivet.  I drilled just enough to get to a very thin edge of the rivet without getting into the sheet metal sides of the shank.

A small sharp chisel easily peeled the remaining edge of the rounded over rivet off. A tapered punch and hammer easily drove the old rivet out.

Here is the rivet after removal. I was surprised at the lack of wear on the shank of it. This illustrates how the wear is moved to the bushing and the seed tube guard.

Here is the amount of wear on the RK guard.

Here is the Valion ready to be installed. 

The Valion also has a nub on the bottom and a passageway through it if you would like to apply fertilizer in furrow.

Here is the Herschel rivet tool to make the rounded head on the front rivet.

It has just enough reach and clearance to get to the rivet without removing the Keeton gold mounting.

Here is the completed install and formed rivet. Here you can see the dimple that is left in the center which is ideal for drilling out the next time around.

This was not meant to be a bash or endorsement of either product. I think they are both excellent products that are a huge improvement in design over the original OEM set up.

This time around Exapta was a better "value" for my situation. We will see how it compares to the RK on life and longevity.

Hope someone will find this post helpful in the future.