New kit steals the show at Royal Highland 2023

A varied selection of new machinery and equipment was presented for the first time at this year’s Royal Highland Show, held from 22-25 June in Ingliston.

Below, we round up some highlights.

See also: First impressions: Munro’s no-nonsense electric off-roader

Anaerobic digester operators wanting a more finely chopped feedstock are catered for by this double-chop processor from Cross Agricultural.

The standard version comes with one tractor pto-driven shredding mechanism, comprising a rotor with rigid blades working against a stationary knife comb, but the new model has a second processing unit beneath.

The resulting processed fodder beet or waste fruit and veg is chopped finer, but there is a throughput penalty of about 40%.

There are several variations, including four working widths – 0.8m, 1m, 1.5m (pictured) and 2m – electric drive and a wheel tow kit; pallet fork sockets are standard for shifting the machine on-site.

A 1.5m double-chop model with stone protection is priced around £30,000 and a single-chop with pto input is £10,000.

Tractor loader manufacturer MX introduced a modular front weight and toolbox collection. It features a central interface carried on a tractor’s front linkage, to which adjustable reflector wing sections can be added as width markers.

When the further option of a storage unit is fitted behind the core MultiBumper unit, this package is priced at £1,750.

Then there is the further option of mounting MX’s existing £295 MultiMass toolbox (pictured above in the background) on the front – it comes complete with a towing clevis and pin.

The MultiBumper system is currently available in John Deere green, black and Agco grey as used across the Fendt, MF and Valtra ranges.

Combining a vertical blade log splitter with a diddy trailer chassis creates a handy means of shifting the cleaving equipment from one location to another without having to heave it into the back of a van or pickup.

The splitter mast pivots to a horizontal position for travel and a small Honda petrol engine powers the hydraulics.

Logs are held in a “clap hands” clamp and two-handed control ensures the operator stands well clear of the blade for safety.

Trailer specialist Ifor Williams prices the device at £2,950.

With on-the-go tyre pressure management becoming more widespread on tractors, Chafer now offers the facility on its Sentry trailed sprayers to get the same benefits.

The PTG system is fully integrated with the BPW steering axle, and the isobus control package enables operators to set up “road” and “field” pressures and flick between the two.

For use with a tractor already equipped with central tyre inflation, the add-on cost for a new Sentry is about £6,000.

Portequip had two customer project trailers on show – an 11m-long livestock transporter destined for a large outdoor pig operation, and a feed trailer with auto-lockable head yokes to secure cattle for inspection or treatment.

The 27t stock transporter runs on triple ADR commercial axles with leaf spring suspension and air brakes, and has a hydraulic loading ramp, aluminium ramp gates and two internal divisions to move up to three groups of pigs at a time.

Pallet fork pockets beneath the hand rail enable the sides to be removed so the trailer can be used for carting bales.

The company’s standard feed trailer, which has a retractable telescopic drawbar, is already available with tombstone or slanted rails all round, but the bespoke build has 28 places with pivoting bar headstocks.

When cattle need inspecting, tagging, injecting or other treatments, a rotating bar brings latches into play to hold the animals securely when they enter to feed until they are collectively released.

A repeat example would be priced at about £6,500.

New Zealand equipment manufacturer Hustler continues to expand the selection of products available in the UK, the latest being the dual-purpose Hurricane LX104 bale feeder/bedder.

This machine has much the same structure as the Chainless bale unroller, as it has a linkage-mounted headstock with auto-connect drive coupling that is unlatched and withdrawn to spike a bale for loading onto the low-friction bed.

A chain-and-slat conveyor then feeds bales to twin horizontal rotors that peel away the layers or flakes – but the Hurricane has a third, faster-turning rotor with both static blades and swinging flails.

With this assembly lifted clear, silage or hay is directed to the ground either outdoors or along a feed barrier; in its working position, straw is teased out and thrown 7-10m, depending on its condition, for bedding.

The machine handles a single round bale or a square bale up to 2.4m long once an extension platform has been added to the basic tilting feed deck.

List price is £15,180.

Trailer and spreader maker Ktwo has further improved its push-off silage trailer by adopting the curved-sides design of the established Curve tippers to replace the flat-sided structure of the preceding model.

The sides of the latest Compact & Push trailer are made of slightly thicker steel, yet there is a small weight saving, and the body is now factory prepared for fitting a Transcover front-to-back hydraulic sheeting system.

Ktwo’s two-stage compacting and discharging mechanism is unchanged, as is the stepped-in rear section of the chassis, which allows more steering axle movement than would otherwise be possible.

Commercial 32t axles with parabolic leaf suspension are standard, with basic or more sophisticated active hydraulic suspension systems optional.

Weigh cells are increasingly popular, with contractors kitting out, say, one in four trailers to provide data for checking the calibration of forage harvester on-board yield monitors.

The Compact & Push 2000 with 500mm body extensions exhibited costs about £60,000.

With an isobus-compatible controller and its own wifi signal, the Seed Con seed-broadcasting option from Technik-Plus for Duvelsdorf’s Green Rake pasture groomer enables operators to use an app remotely to go through the calibration process or call up one of five stored settings from previous calibrations.

It saves having to go back and forth between the tractor and implement; and a Cloud platform that is also part of the package provides settings, work plans and work completed records for farm management use – and for billing in the case of contractors.

Lynx Engineering recently started distributing the Duvelsdorf range in Great Britain as well as Ireland.

A Hiab crane installation gives users of Nugent’s road trailer independent bulk loading and unloading capability.

An uprated chassis, a pair of hydraulic outriggers, two high-capacity batteries to power the crane’s hydraulic system, and both solar and towing vehicle charging make up the package.

Adding a third stabiliser alongside the drawbar allows the crane to also handle loads into and out of a pickup bed.

Hiab’s T-CLX 018 is rated 995kg at 1.2m radius and can still pick up 420kg at the 4.2m full extension.

Complete with dropsides, the 3.6×1.82m (12x6ft) trailer has 2t of payload capacity and the package is priced at £18,500.

A prototype trailed four-row potato planter dominated the Standen Engineering exhibit, hoping to appeal to growers using an increasingly popular four-row harvester and wanting the rig-spacing planting accuracy that a six-row planter approach can have difficulty providing.

The newcomer uses the proven ridge opening, cup planting and ridge-closing hardware from Standen’s two-row, tractor-mounted model but with a linkage-mounted counter-weight beam and Dromone ball and cup hitch up front.

To minimise soil compaction, large-diameter row crop wheels support the machine at the back, running outside the newly planted rigs in work, but then repositioned within the width of the planter by hydraulic cylinders for road travel with an escort vehicle.

A novel double-channel race produced by Yorkshire-based American Squeeze Crush Systems aims to tap into the psyche of cattle that makes them want to move in a group rather than individually.

The Raging Double Alley race is adjustable between 80cm and 40cm by pushing the pivoting side panels into position to prevent cattle of a wide range of sizes from turning around. There are anti-jump bars overhead while catwalks down the side enable cattle to be dosed with pour-on medications.

The central divide has a panelled lower half but open upper structure so the cattle can both see and feel their neighbour, which apparently encourages them to draw naturally towards the crush.

“It really does work,” it maintains. “The first of these is being used on a farm receiving 60 fresh cattle a week that have no experience of the handling system, but they don’t need driving, so the team has been cut back from three to just one.”

The company anticipates installing two race sections ahead of the crush, which in the case of its Raging Bull hydraulic model also has features drawing on cattle behaviour – including a headstock that closes on pivots from behind the animal’s peripheral vision rather than from the side.

It also has a “neck stretcher” function and openings designed specifically for TB testing access and for cleaning the shoulders and brisket.

Kubota’s new M5-102 Narrow orchard and vineyard tractor made its UK debut at the show, featuring an engine compliant with the Euro Stage 5 emissions rules and packaging that permits several features missing from its predecessor.

The newcomer has a 3.8-litre diesel generating 106hp and using diesel exhaust fluid (AdBlue) after-treatment, which Kubota engineers have managed to package out of sight under the hood, where the AdBlue filler is located (in contrast to the diesel tank’s rear filler location).

The drivetrain comprises a 40kph 36×36 transmission (six speeds in three ranges plus two-speed powershift with powershuttle) and a portal front drive axle with Kubota’s Bi-Speed turn mechanism.

Front axle suspension can be added along with a front linkage and pto package, and a new mid-mount hydraulic valves set-up caters for front-mounted equipment.

Despite these features, on the narrowest tyres and track setting, the tractor is no more than 1.2m wide.

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