Home-Built Air Seeder Works Like A Commercial Unit

1997 - Volume #21, Issue #4, Page #10

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When the disk seeder Jim Woods used to seed small grains wore out, the Oyen, Alberta, farmer designed and built his own air seeder to plant 1,500 acres of small grains.
"I can seed and apply dry fertilizer and granular chemicals all in one pass," says Woods, who calls his rig the "Woods 6094" (60 for the Deere 6030 he uses to pull it and 94 for the year he built it).
Woods built the seeder around a Morris 531 35-ft. deep till cultivator. It has 16-in. sweeps on 12-in. spacings and is fitted with single chute seed boots behind the sweeps. "Twelve-inch spacings permit better residue flow than the 7 or 8-in. spacings used on a lot of commercial air seeders and the single chute boot spreads seed out about 8 in.," he notes.
He mounted a big Bee Line fan on back of the cultivator and a Bee Line seed box on each side to provide enough capacity for 20 bags of granular chemical. Woods can use the cultivator alone or with the two-compartment seed and fertilizer cart he built.
The cart is built on the frame and running gear of a 1940's International 3-ton truck. To allow him to vary rates, metering augers drive off the truck differential via two 9-speed gear-boxes Woods took off the fertilizer boxes on his retired Massey 36 disk seeder. Sheet steel for the hopper was cut at a local welding shop and welded together by Woods. It has capacity for 120 bu. of wheat seed and 4,000 lbs. of fertilizer.
The cart blows seed and fertilizer up to the cultivator through 5-in. dia. Borgault tubes and 1-in. dia. Borgault splitters.
He pulls a coil packer behind the cart. He designed and built a hitch for the packer out of 4-in. sq. tubing that runs off the same hydraulic system as the augers on the cart and allows him to fold the gangs hydraulically.
Woods plants wheat into summer fallow at about 70 lbs. per acre traveling about 5 mph and applying 50 to 60 lbs. of nitrogen and phosphorous in a 35-15 blend. In standing stubble, he plants at about 4 mph and uses up to 100 lbs. of fertilizer.
Woods built the rig for about $13,000 (Canadian).
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Jim Woods, Box 638, Oyen, Alberta, Canada T0J 2J0 (ph 403 676-2269).

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Home-Built Air Seeder Works Like A Commercial Unit AIR SEEDERS Air Seeders (42B) 21-4-10 When the disk seeder Jim Woods used to seed small grains wore out, the Oyen, Alberta, farmer designed and built his own air seeder to plant 1,500 acres of small grains. "I can seed and apply dry fertilizer and granular chemicals all in one pass," says Woods, who calls his rig the "Woods 6094" (60 for the Deere 6030 he uses to pull it and 94 for the year he built it). Woods built the seeder around a Morris 531 35-ft. deep till cultivator. It has 16-in. sweeps on 12-in. spacings and is fitted with single chute seed boots behind the sweeps. "Twelve-inch spacings permit better residue flow than the 7 or 8-in. spacings used on a lot of commercial air seeders and the single chute boot spreads seed out about 8 in.," he notes. He mounted a big Bee Line fan on back of the cultivator and a Bee Line seed box on each side to provide enough capacity for 20 bags of granular chemical. Woods can use the cultivator alone or with the two-compartment seed and fertilizer cart he built. The cart is built on the frame and running gear of a 1940's International 3-ton truck. To allow him to vary rates, metering augers drive off the truck differential via two 9-speed gear-boxes Woods took off the fertilizer boxes on his retired Massey 36 disk seeder. Sheet steel for the hopper was cut at a local welding shop and welded together by Woods. It has capacity for 120 bu. of wheat seed and 4,000 lbs. of fertilizer. The cart blows seed and fertilizer up to the cultivator through 5-in. dia. Borgault tubes and 1-in. dia. Borgault splitters. He pulls a coil packer behind the cart. He designed and built a hitch for the packer out of 4-in. sq. tubing that runs off the same hydraulic system as the augers on the cart and allows him to fold the gangs hydraulically. Woods plants wheat into summer fallow at about 70 lbs. per acre traveling about 5 mph and applying 50 to 60 lbs. of nitrogen and phosphorous in a 35-15 blend. In standing stubble, he plants at about 4 mph and uses up to 100 lbs. of fertilizer. Woods built the rig for about $13,000 (Canadian). Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Jim Woods, Box 638, Oyen, Alberta, Canada TOJ 2JO (ph 403 676-2269).

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