The nice folks we bought our place from have a Kubota, and it is definitely less touchy and smoother in how it runs, brakes, etc. I suppose you get what you pay for.
But, our deere (his name is Melvyn) seems to be really versatile, which is what we needed. We can mow just about anything under 1-2 inches thick, pull out bigger stuff, and do all kinds of crazy attachments off the PTO. We didn’t think a lawn tractor type would work so well on our hilly terrain, plus I do anticipate some digging, plowing, etc. in our future.
Also, I am enjoying discussing tractors more than I would have expected. And something about riding it around, doing work, makes me feel useful.
Not really, in software the cost is in the development, not in replicating it for your own use. For hardware, there are development costs, but they are small compared to manufacturing the hardware. Thus to make custom software viable, your increase profit has to cover most of your costs (unlikely). To make custom hardware viable, benefits only have to match the relatively small development costs, not the manufacturing costs.
It’s unfortunate, but the cost dynamics are quite different between the two.
Well, my father is still doing all his own servicing of his Farmall Cub, which we think is 1955 vintage, so they certainly did make them to last. On the other hand, I’d hate to know what the emissions are for it.
It’s often attributed to Marx, but the most concrete reference I could find was a “I can’t remember reading this in any of his works, so it’s probably in Das Kapital (because that’s so massive you’re bound to forget parts)”. Feel free to give a book+page number reference, ofc.
And even if it is a Marx quote, which it well might be - he could still be right. With the crucial difference that Marx intended it as critique and the Kochs as an inspiration, ofc.
That’s even worse. An old man in a suit telling me that I cannot (for whatever reason) play with my own toys is what makes me want to make a machine gun and go hunting bureaucrats.
Does anyone think John Deere wants to build any diesel equipment that requires the use of Diesel Exhaust Fluid (or pick your company and brand moniker for it)? I work on JD excavators and trust me it’s far, far simpler to work on something destined for say the South American market, where there is limited emission laws (aka similar level to what you would have seen being made here in the 80’s to early 90’s). Compare that to a modern unit sold in the US…upgraded engine, high efficiency catalytic converter, DEF injection/after treatment system, all of the necessary sensors and software to monitor it all, not to mention the extra system complexity for failure and additional build/repair time per machine.
And it comes down to being a purely government regulation thing. Like to the point where JD gets shit if certain emission certification stickers (yes a fucking sticker) isn’t on a new machine. So no, your open source custom hackable software isn’t going to fly with governmental regulations. Because you can have a clean environment or you can have your tweakable machine - but not both.
There’s no shortage of used equipment that is in direct competition, and there’s nothing to prevent an open-source competitor from coming along. I can see a nascent Chinese brand coming along and freeing things up. But I’m also very surprised there isn’t a huge cottage industry for ECU chipping, as exists in the automotive world. I don’t think the legal obstacles are any different.
Computerized controls have added a shitload of efficiency to farm equipment, just as they have with conventional vehicles. I suspect there are valid competition-based reasons for keeping many things secret.
In contrast to others here, I think the corporate nature of large-scale US farming might actually help combat this problem, as these large holdings are better positioned to fight the equipment manufacturers than individual farmers are, to the extent they have greater bargaining power. Of course, if they have redundant equipment they’re also somewhat insulated from the problems that small farmers face, though, as the temporary loss of a single machine is of much less gravity.
OBD is on every modern car only because legislation made it mandatory, in large part as a way to allow unaffiliated mechanics to continue to exist. Without it, most repairs would be dealer-only, or independent mechanics would specialize towards a few brands.
Maybe legislating an OBD-equivalent that frees up only the diagnostic information would be appropriate?
How dare they tell me I can’t pollute the air my neighbours breathe?! What’s next, are they going to insist I vaccinate my children, too?
I’m unsurprised. On an average cross-country ride you’ll see more cars than tractors, even if you choose your path through rural areas only. The market is not big enough for a huge cottage industry. But there are some nascent attempts, mentioned in the article, though more person-to-person than industry per se.
Which withstand reverse engineering in a well equipped lab for about 30 seconds. Even if you cannot get into the chip itself, you can put it on a test bed and run it through a battery of tests as a black box, and then reconstruct the input-output functions. A small speed bump for “competitors”, a big obstacle for the end users.
Could partially work, depending how much gets opened. The more the better.
So instead of ability to have a slightly less non-smokey machine than a non-hackable non-repairable one, you get to deal with 70’s machines that take three times as much fuel and who knows how much more particulates in the output. Great choice.
Besides there’s not enough tractors out there to make a significant effect on air pollution anyway, even if every one’s ECU got hacked in the most crude way.
Nice red herring, sir. The color is a beautifully vibrant carmine.
Chips are frequently made for relatively low production sports cars, like the Audi TT. I don’t see very many of those at all. And given that it’s probably a lot more important to have your tractor working than to wring out another 20 horsepower from your sports car, I suspect the dollar value of the farm equipment market isn’t much smaller. This is especially the case if these systems “withstand reverse engineering in a well equipped lab for about 30 seconds.”
Oh, so your argument really wasn’t about the government telling you what you can or cannot do with your own toys, but just a really limited utilitarian argument about how emissions concerns aren’t well founded when it comes to farm equipment. Got it.
But the mindsets of farmers are quite different, in average, from the mindsets of the sports cars owners. Though there may be an overlap.
Actually, both. I don’t take lightly to be bossed around when it comes to my toys, as a matter of principle, and double so if it’s by “decisionmakers” who wouldn’t know the business end of a soldering iron if they touched it. And I am rare enough (grumble) that short of a larger nuclear reactor failure my impact is limited enough to not care significantly.
Pretty much completely wrong, whether you’re measuring farm size or ownership. Average farm size is 234 acres; mean farm size is 45 acres; midpoint acreage is 1,100 [half of all acres are on farms of less than 1,100 acres]. (For scale, there are 640 acres in a square mile. Here on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, “square mile” family farms are quite common, with 40- and 80-acre family farms the most plentiful.)
Here’s USDA in 2013, using 2011 data: “96% of all U.S. farms with cropland are family farms [defined as a ‘principal operator, together with people related to the operator by blood or marriage, owns more than half of the farm business.’]. They accounted for 87 percent of the total value of crop production, including well over 90 percent of production for major field crops, as well as most fruit, vegetable, and nursery production, although nonfamily farms held more significant shares in the latter categories. Nonfamily farms are not necessarily large, complex, corporate entities; many are operated by small and closely held partnership groups of unrelated people. Based on census of agriculture data, nonfamily corporations with more than 10 stockholders—which would include public corporations—accounted for roughly 2 percent of the total value of U.S. farm production in 2007, largely unchanged from their share in 1982.”
Granted, slightly more than 2% of U.S. farms account for 34% of cropland, but 50% of U.S. farms are less than 50 acres. And while there has been strong consolidation of farms (midpoint acreage has not quite doubled since 1982, while total farmland acreage has remained almost constant) over the past 30 years, this appears to be slowing. (And in my limited experience here in Michigan, most of that consolidation results in larger family farms, not branded mega-corp farms.) It’s still safe to sing that “taxes on the farmer feeds us all.”
