UniForce Eliminates Workarounds For John Deere Drills

The John Deere 50 / 60 /90 series drills are originally equipped with a down-force spring. Since the spring is nearly parallel to the arm, it tends to be susceptible to changes in the opener position.

The Problem with John Deere Drills
When you compress that down-force spring a couple of inches, you maybe get approx. 500 pounds of actual down pressure on the opener. When the spring goes into a depression (no field is laser level), it relaxes and you are getting around half as much pressure as you need on those rows, which results in failure to maintain the right depth. Because of lack of depth, your no till stands may fail because of not enough moisture. Meanwhile, the other openers are bearing extra weight, resulting in some openers having 700-800 pounds of pressure, giving you excessively compacted sidewalls.

Workarounds for John Deere Drills
To get around this issue, many farmers crank the pressure way up to help their drill perform in no till conditions. As a result, more frame weight must be added to keep the drill frame from lifting. Often, many dozens of suitcase weights are necessary on the John Deere air drills. All of this rigging of your John Deere drill can be eliminated with our hydraulic down-pressure system.

How to make the John Deere 50 / 60 / 90 series drills work a lot better.
With Exapta’s UniForce hydraulic cylinder, you get uniform pressure throughout the full range of stroke, no matter if you are down in a depression or way up on a mound. This allows you to use the frame weight far more effectively. Also, the UniForce gives you more range of stroke than with the OEM spring—about an inch more down-stroke plus far more upstroke.

The cylinders are attached with larger, half inch hoses so that the UniForce responds very quickly as it’s going up and down on the terrain. Other hydraulic down pressure systems may try to get by with smaller hoses but Exapta does not cut corners. Our cylinders are very easy to install. Remove the OEM spring and the holding mechanism and the cylinder goes into place with the original pin and a special bushing system that holds it in place on the bottom.

Check out our catalog of no till equipment parts – you can view, download a PDF, or we’ll be happy to mail you a catalog.
For information on Exapta parts and equipment for no till farming, call (800) 417-8020, or e-mail info@notillagriculture.com.