How do farmers also have their fields plowed so straight for so far? Do they use GPS guidance somehow? And if they use some sort of tech, were they able to plow fields this straight back in the day?
In: 250
Non farmer here. Watch clarksons farm on Amazon. You can watch an idiot try to do it and then see him learn the right way (along with many other things)
Back in the day: you drove straight.
Nowadays: you tell the field you are straight and it does the thing.
Today, n large farms? Yes. They use GPS.
In the old days? Point the plow at a landmark and make as straight a line as you can, then lay each furrow against the previous one. Your lines will be “pretty straight”
Most of have 10,000 to 20,000 acres.
They have auto steer on tractors , spray rigs etc. they tram lines on gps so that the soils only get compacted in lines as well.
Soil compaction is massive issue
They also match the size of spray rigs to the bars and headers. Ie generally run 40 foot or 60 foot gear
GPS. My cousin is a farmer. He just sits there and the tractor drives itself. It does the rows super precisely too.
Modern tractors come with autoguidance features that allow the tractor to self drive in a straight line. Not only that, but after the turn at the end of the field (which can be done manually or automatically) the system starts the next line exactly at the right width to avoid missing a strip or overlapping with the previous one.
Basic GPS service has a precision of 10 cm (4 inches), there are more precise services that do real time correction on the GPS signal, these go to a precision of 2,5 cm (1 inch) but cost more money. Typically it’s a subscription based service.
Source: I work at one of the main tractor manufacturers
As a farmer whose only equipment with GPS control is the sprayer, it’s all eyeballed.
Also, most decent farmers don’t “plow” their field every year. If you did/do, you’re destroying thr moisture of your soil year after year and bringing yourself closer to the dirty 30s.
Anyway, depending on size of the operation, fields can be either eyeballed or input into GPS. Older/smaller farms eyeball it. Newer/bigger farms use GPS.
If you really cared about being straight, most seeders/cultivators had marker arms, similar to how older sprayers had foaming nozzles. These would “paint” a line for you To follow so you could make sure you were maximizing your tool width.
Like the dodo, these have been phased out.
Once you get the first pass done, you just line your tires or equipment width on the first pass and repeat.
Spraying and fertilizer spreading is where GPS parallel swathing comes in handy.
I grew up on a farm before GPS. Our largest field was 12 acres. We would pick a tree, we knew which was the center tree on the far side, and line up the hood ornament.
plowing a straight line isn’t rocket science.
even if you had no fence or canal to guide you (or GPS lol) you can figure out how to walk a beast or drive a tractor in a relatively straight line without much effort.
ftr: planes flew in relatively straight lines without guides from the very beginning.
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