[AT] OT--- 800 IH plate planter

[Greg Hass]

First off, if you don't mind telling us, how many row unit is this. Also 
I take it that this is a plate planter. If so, the no.1 thing is to make 
sure you have the right size plates to match the seed size. Also check 
the back-up plates under the seed plates for wear. Unless they changed 
from earlier plate planters, there is a hump inside the hopper that the 
plate goes under. Inside this are 2 "dogs" that are spring loaded and 
keep only one seed at a time from getting into the seed cells. Next in 
line is a arm with a roller on the end (early plate planters just had a 
point) and it to is spring loaded and its job is to make sure all seeds 
are ejected from the seed cells. Make sure all these parts are free to 
move and that none of the springs are broken. Most of the rest is as you 
said. As for the fertilizer, both me and my brother quit applying it 
with the planter years ago. One reason was we had no good way to handle 
it. The main reason was because we could never get the correct amount 
on. We either seemed to get 30% too much or 30% too little. It had 
nothing to do with planter settings, but with humidity in the air and 
the size of granules and the amount of fines  in the fertilizer. For 
many years we have just broadcast it with a spreader from the fertilizer 
company. We only plant 20-50 acres a year so this is our cheapest way. 
(It just occurred to me, I am talking dry fertilizer). All of the large 
farmers around us have gone to liquid fertilizer which doesn't vary like 
dry does. Also they all have new enough planters that they have flow 
meters hooked to computers and gps to apply the fertilizer almost to the 
pound. I simply cannot afford the cost for the limited acres I do. As an 
example, last year my cousin bought a new Kinze planter; 24 row-30 inch. 
It cost $150,000. I wouldn't go into all the options at this time, but 
they did debate for several weeks whether to steer with just auto-steer 
or have markers as a backup. They went with just auto-steer because 
markers cost $14,000 (no I didn't make a mistake).
            Greg Hass