At the Tillage-Live event last week, held in East Lothian, Kverneland demonstrated its new Ecomat on-land, shallow plough ahead of its launch next year.
It was developed as an option for minimum tillage seedbed preparation, offering mechanical control of weeds and pests to reduce reliance on chemical methods.
“Ecomat is a halfway house between a plough and a cultivator,” explained product specialist Adam Burt. “As a shallow plough, the Ecomat still turns the soil over but without needing to work as deep as a traditional plough. This means it’s much easier to pull, and it does a far better job of inversion than a cultivator.”
The latest version can work at depths from 6cm down to 18cm, resulting in higher output and lower fuel consumption per acre. With ten furrows, it is equipped with short, high-speed bodies of either steel or plastic, and as it is an on-land plough wider tyres can be fitted to the tractor to reduce compaction.
Furrow widths can be mechanically adjusted between 30cm and 50cm for working widths between 3m and 5m, while a 65cm point-to-point clearance results in a compact construction. The safely manage the length of the plough, it also features the Trailer Transport System, which positions the headstock so that the machine runs on the transport wheel and steers like a trailer.
