Putting the Garford Robocrop Side Shift System to the Test

The team from Precision Ag Solutions recently installed a Garford Robocrop Side Shift System for a sorghum farmer at Jondaryan, Queensland.

The Robocrop System comes with a digital camera and computer system which controls a hydraulic side shift that moves cultivating tynes for accurate precision and control between rows. This is very useful in the fight against herbicide resistance by allowing precise inter-row tillage.

HOW IT WORKS

The crop foliage ahead of the machine is viewed by a video camera. The image is processed by a computer to find the higher concentrations of green pixels relating to the crop rows. Due to the large area viewed by the camera and the multiple crop line processing, an excellent average crop row centre-line tracking is achieved.

Robocrop compares the resulting image to a predetermined grid pattern relating to the crop row spacing. This information is then utilised to bring the equipment onto the row centres via the hydraulic side shift.