Tractor tire compaction

There is a young guy on you tube in IA with a popular farming video each day. Last week he had his Case-IH 340 hp planter tractor tires changed to the the new LSW wide single tires on all four corners. Looks like the tire on the right in the picture. So he has no duals now just 4 super singles on a 28,000 lb - 30,000 lb tractor that is going to pull his corn planter . He said the reason he did this was the singles will give less side wall compaction where the corn seed is dropped in the furrow than the 8 dual wheels would have.. The singles are wide enough that they will drive over the pathway of 2 corn rows or 4 in total for both wheels each pass across the field. The 8 dual wheels were designed to not be in any pathway where a corn row would be planted. Is he going to suffer a yield loss on the 4 rows where these super single tires are running over corn rows compacting the soil ? Has he thought this tire change over correctly on a planter tractor with respect to corn yield ?

Those narrow tires will pack more even where the corn doesnt go than going to the wide tire

Physics tells us that on average the soil compaction under a tire is equal to the inflation pressure regardless of the load it is carrying. The more square inches of rubber you can put down on the ground to carry a given weight the lower the inflation pressure you can run. These large tires are probably inflated to something well under 10 psi where the skinny duals were probably double that. 10 psi of compaction directly over the row will cause less damage than two tracks of 20 psi compaction with a narrow softer strip between them. If the roots start out in softer ground then hit a zone of compacted soil they will turn to the side and not spread out as much.

Kind of like the snow shoe effect maybe . . . .

Link to
Cole the Cornstar

I would be more concerned with the ride of the row unit in the tire track than the compaction. A bouncing row unit will have problems. A properly adjusted row cleaner might help.

Here on the prairies, it is not uncommon to pull a corn planter behind a big tracked tractor. There is always at least a couple rows in the tracks.

Will it affect yield? Keep watching. You'll find out.

I believe that is one of the things they're going to keep an eye on this year.

On soybeans neither way makes a real big difference in normal conditions.

For corn they have found the two skinny tires straddling a row compact the ground really deeply on both sides of that row. The corn plant cant grow roots to,either side and end up growing in a 10 inch width and then down. This limits that row as most of our nutrients are in the top 2-3 inches of soil. So the dual skinny tires creates two rows that do poorly.

Pinch rows it is called. Both sides of the row is pinched with compaction.

They are still experimenting with those big wide tires. The belief is that they carry a low enough pressure and spread the companion over enough surface that it doesnt hurt the rows so very much at all. I think it has to be in firm ground, notill basically? And then it assumes good normal conditions. Get a little wet or loose ground and all bets are off.

Has he done anything with his planter? Most planters big enough for that tractor also carry a lot of weight on pairs of implement tires that also create compaction on both sides of a row, so that would need to be addressed as well. Many have gone to a single track instead of duals on each side of the planter. If there is heavy compaction on one side of the corn plant, it can still send roots the other direction and find nutrients.

Paul

I think so. look at the foot print of a big loaded lime spreader truck's tracks on soft ground after it goes across a field.