what horse power needed to drive an agitator

Tomjim

what horse power would you need to drive an agitator.

Would a Zetor Crystal be able to do it or a MF 390

Dozer Dave

You would want 150hp anyway.

_Brian

Dozer Dave wrote: »

You would want 150hp anyway.

Nope..
It depends on the agitator.

We have a smaller NC and our 1974 DB996 runs it fine, think it was 74HP ex factory.

There was an awful lot of work done on farms across Ireland when 150HP tractors were a fancy notion, never mind 4WD

raypallas

Tomjim wrote:

Would a Zetor Crystal be able to do it or a MF 390

We borrow a neighbours cross agitator from time to time and our 9641 zetor drives it fine. We also have a crystal but that would be asking a lot of it as it's really down on power as the injector pump is poor. There's a man not to far anyway from me and he uses a 165 to drive an abbey agitator but thats in an open tank.

ford 5600

Tomjim wrote: »

what horse power would you need to drive an agitator.

Would a Zetor Crystal be able to do it or a MF 390

I drive an NC 3000 with either a Zetor 8145, or an old Ursus 385. Works fine on either. Enough of water, and keeping silage/straw out of the tank is very important to getting it stirred easily.

Reggie.

My neighbour borrows my 398 for agitating his tanks. Don't know the model of the slurry pump but the owner runs it on a landini legend which is 120 hp I think.

OnDtown

It rerally depends on the agitator your running.
We have a Belmac machine (really good agitator) but it's 2:1 Ratio. We drive it fine with 140hp but neighbour got one and his 110hp JD failed to drive it.
We used to have an older model which I think was 3:1 Ratio and 90hp used to drive it fine.

Blackgrass

Reggie. wrote: »

My neighbour borrows my 398 for agitating his tanks. Don't know the model of the slurry pump but the owner runs it on a landini legend which is 120 hp I think.

One of main men here reckons it's the keeping of an engine to run it hot and hard for a few hours every so often. Just don't let it boil :pac::rolleyes:

Reggie.

Blackgrass wrote: »

One of main men here reckons it's the keeping of an engine to run it hot and hard for a few hours every so often. Just don't let it boil :pac::rolleyes:

That's it. It's a great thing on an engine to give it a good "run" every now and then
Neighbour uses mine as the roof is too low for the contractors machine.

Suckler

Blackgrass wrote: »

One of main men here reckons it's the keeping of an engine to run it hot and hard for a few hours every so often. Just don't let it boil :pac::rolleyes:

Fine line between running it hot and hard and boiling it - you'd want the operator to known the difference!

Neighbors Massey 185 or 188 exhaust manifold would be glowing bright red agitating.

blue5000

Suckler wrote: »

Fine line between running it hot and hard and boiling it - you'd want the operator to known the difference!

Neighbors Massey 185 or 188 exhaust manifold would be glowing bright red agitating.

Been there, done that, no harm done:)

joejobrien

You can pretty much drive it with most 70/80 hp tractors but it depends on how much output you want from the agitator. Have redrock here on 105 hp , does a fine job but it its heavy and thick you will murder it , call for water straight away!!!!.
So yes a smaller tractor will do the job but you can kill it, happy with that????
Also the lenght of tank is an important factor alsot. The further you push the slurry in an underground tank the more power is required.

Also the more presure the tractor is under the shorter the life of it becomes.

_Brian

joejobrien wrote: »

You can pretty much drive it with most 70/80 hp tractors but it depends on how much output you want from the agitator. Have redrock here on 105 hp , does a fine job but it its heavy and thick you will murder it , call for water straight away!!!!.
So yes a smaller tractor will do the job but you can kill it, happy with that????
Also the lenght of tank is an important factor alsot. The further you push the slurry in an underground tank the more power is required.

Also the more presure the tractor is under the shorter the life of it becomes.

This is a good point.
The man agitating is important too.

I've seem lads start up and pump all water down the tank away from themselves. Then they can do nothing straight away as they need water drawn in.

tomwaterford

Blackgrass wrote: »

One of main men here reckons it's the keeping of an engine to run it hot and hard for a few hours every so often. Just don't let it boil :pac::rolleyes:

Keep them well serviced if you going going this and rads clear with good fan belts

Willfarman

Contractor is excellent value for this job Imo.

Reggie.

Willfarman wrote: »

Contractor is excellent value for this job Imo.

Its one job that's hard on a machine

st1979

Reggie. wrote:

Its one job that's hard on a machine

For some livestock farmers it might be the best thing for your tractor. Not good for engines pottering about. Friend of mine used to sell Honda cars. Lots of grannies would buy civics. Said when one of them was traded in he would take it home for the weekend and drive the hell out of it. Car then would be much free er easier reving etc.

lakill Farm

st1979 wrote: »

For some livestock farmers it might be the best thing for your tractor. Not good for engines pottering about. Friend of mine used to sell Honda cars. Lots of grannies would buy civics. Said when one of them was traded in he would take it home for the weekend and drive the hell out of it. Car then would be much free er easier reving etc.

heard similar off a lad who used to work with an agri contractor who bought 3x new MF399 . He drove the mower with one, while 2 other went on trailers.

After 6 months the mower 399 was away and he used one of the 399 from the trailers and said it was completely dead as it had never been worked hard and cleaned out

_Brian

st1979 wrote: »

For some livestock farmers it might be the best thing for your tractor. Not good for engines pottering about. Friend of mine used to sell Honda cars. Lots of grannies would buy civics. Said when one of them was traded in he would take it home for the weekend and drive the hell out of it. Car then would be much free er easier reving etc.

When my mother in law was alive and driving , every now and them she would ask me to take her car and give it a good hard driving. She always felt it went far better afterwards and used less petrol.

I suppose it's similar to the DPF problems seem in many diesels used for small round town trips. If they're not given regular long hard drives where they sustain high temperatures, they clog up and need premature replacement.

blue5000

For those of us old enough to have had to 'run in' new engines, the harder they worked from brand new the better they were. I had a turbo diesel escort when I was young, every time I got into it I made it my business to hit 90 and I ain't talking KMs. Young lad in the garage where I bought it could not get over how lively the car was when it was in for a service, I was sorry to see it go.

Willfarman

blue5000 wrote: »

For those of us old enough to have had to 'run in' new engines, the harder they worked from brand new the better they were. I had a turbo diesel escort when I was young, every time I got into it I made it my business to hit 90 and I ain't talking KMs. Young lad in the garage where I bought it could not get over how lively the car was when it was in for a service, I was sorry to see it go.

A great yoke only for their nasty habit of breaking timing belts

simx

Reggie. wrote: »

Its one job that's hard on a machine

Would agree to a degree, was on to my cousin to go halves with me on an agitator a neighbour was selling two years ago, he was sceptical as he reckoned it was feirce hard on tractor but I debated the convienience side of it as it's handy to go stir a handy bit if only going spreading one or two paddocks and no waiting on contractor at certain times of the year when everyone is shouting, it has itself well paid for at this stage and would consider it a worthwhile purchase here anyway but everyones situation is different, that said if time is a factor I will still ring contractor

foxy farmer

My contractor had a Hi Spec pump for years. If they were busy you'd take it and mix the tanks and they'd spread it. My ford 6600 would drive it flat out.
They wanted to increase the output from the pump so they expanded the impeller by 3-4 inches. The 6600 would drive it at around18-1900 revs and no more. Even my jd 6400 couldn't master it. Have a Newrock now myself and the 6400 will stick at it all day. Impeller isn't too big. The size of the impeller is definitely a big factor in my opinion.

Reggie.

simx wrote: »

Would agree to a degree, was on to my cousin to go halves with me on an agitator a neighbour was selling two years ago, he was sceptical as he reckoned it was feirce hard on tractor but I debated the convienience side of it as it's handy to go stir a handy bit if only going spreading one or two paddocks and no waiting on contractor at certain times of the year when everyone is shouting, it has itself well paid for at this stage and would consider it a worthwhile purchase here anyway but everyones situation is different, that said if time is a factor I will still ring contractor

I mean to say that you have to watch the machine that it's not overheating. Too many lads just leave the machine running for hours and never look at the dash for the day

Tail painter

Power requirement depends on what agitator you have and how thick is the slurry. I have an open tank so I use a whisk agitator because it is 3 times faster than a pump if you have good access. MF290 will drive it no bother if slurry is watery. MF6180 if slurry is thick. The tank is 150ft x 20ft x 5ft deep. It takes about an hour to agitate thick slurry. I had a close one last summer when fan belts broke on the 6180. I was in the tractor at the time and still didnt get to stop it before the top blew off the radiator. No other harm done.

Kevin McCloud

blue5000 wrote: »

For those of us old enough to have had to 'run in' new engines, the harder they worked from brand new the better they were. I had a turbo diesel escort when I was young, every time I got into it I made it my business to hit 90 and I ain't talking KMs. Young lad in the garage where I bought it could not get over how lively the car was when it was in for a service, I was sorry to see it go.

There is a big difference between driving a diesel van hard on the road and an eejit reddening the engine and exhaust of a tractor aggitating a tank.

GERMAN ROCKS

tis very easy to give the tractor 5 minutes to cool down every now and then when agitating if overheating was going to be a concern. just stop the pto from running and keep the revs at around 13-1400rpm to keep the fan going a bit faster.

lab man

Well lads ibought a nc 3800 there in dec put it on the tm I was surprised how good its to agitate with no pressure at all on either tractor or machine

Reggie.

lab man wrote: »

Well lads ibought a nc 3800 there in dec put it on the tm I was surprised how good its to agitate with no pressure at all on either tractor or machine

Well wear

lab man

thanks lads, best thing ive bought in a while way better than a hi spec

tomwaterford

GERMAN ROCKS wrote: »

tis very easy to give the tractor 5 minutes to cool down every now and then when agitating if overheating was going to be a concern. just stop the pto from running and keep the revs at around 13-1400rpm to keep the fan going a bit faster.

Lower down you revs before stopping the pto though