faq

How long do the teeth last? Most customers get 8-10 years use out of a set of teeth. We've heard
20,000-40,000 acres. Tooth wear depends a lot upon soil type, speed, and roughness of the
ground. We sell very few replacement teeth in spite of the fact that we have over 2000 harrows in
the field.

What makes your harrow better than the McFarlane harrow? We have several major
differences. 1. Our harrow sections are heavier. Heavier flex joints(ours 3/8", theirs 1/4" thick wear
plates), thicker wall pipe(theirs .105, ours .136 wall), stronger "bow ties" that tie the bars together.
2. Our frame has a full length tongue (double bridge frame tongue on the HD models) plus the
a-frame on the main frame of the harrow. Our competitor has only an a-frame. 3. We use 1/4" wall
tubing in all of the main frame. They use 1/8" & 3/16".

Why don't you have a walking beam with tandems? We feel that on a harrow, it is not needed
because the harrow sections are suspended by chains and are laying on the ground. When you go
over rough ground, the chains take up the up and down movement of the frame and the walking
beam is not needed. Another reason is expense and wear. We use hubs, wheels, and tires that are
rated to exceed carrying the total load of the harrow. There is no need to have an extra set of hubs
plus a walking beam pivot to wear out and cause maintenance problems.

Should I buy the HD or standard frame FF model. If you plan to never use more than 12 bar, the
FF model is plenty heavy for anything under 42 ft. If you want to buy a 12 bar with the thought that
you might upgrade to the 16 bar, you'll want the HD. It's really easy to change a HD 12 bar to a 16
bar but a FF can not be made into a 16 bar.

Will residue "ball up" when harrowing? It depends - If the residue has much moisture, has lots
of green, or is extremely large and tough, it is much more likely to ball up or sometimes even roll up
to form a "rope". That will happen with any implement particularly on a harrow where the teeth are
close together. The drier the residue, the better it will break and spread. If you're going to bust
straw or residue, we suggest a good, hot, dry day and run 8-10 miles per hour. Usually the front 2
or 3 bars will sort of load up with straw, but it shakes out to the next harrow bars which break it up
and spreads it out. If you are trying to bust very thick 60+ bushel straw, it may need to be shallow
worked with a disc or run over it several times with the harrow. If you are trying to bust corn stalks,
milo stalks, or large weeds, our harrow will not work unless the stalks have been worked several
times and are starting to become rotten.

How fast should I harrow? For seedbed prep, most people go 5 to 7 1/2 mph for the best results.
When busting straw, 8-10 mph is the norm.

Your competitor Wako uses a tooth with a carbide insert welded to the tooth for long life. We
have good long tooth life (see above) and tooth life is usually a non-issue with our customers after
they have used our harrow for a while. One drawback of the insert is that it collects residue then
doesn't harrow like it should. Their teeth are quite large and far apart which is not as good for
preparing the seedbed.

That same competitor says their 9 row does better in one pass than your 16 row does in two.
When you harrow, the purpose is to settle fluffy soil, smooth the ground, and prepare a seedbed. It
only makes sense that running over it with more bars and teeth closer together will do a better job
of firming and smoothing.

I think I'll just buy an 8 bar because it's cheaper. We only recommend an 8 bar in applications
where you will be pulling the harrow directly behind your field cultivator where the ground is already
soft and mellow. With a flex harrow, 12 bars are the minimum we recommend and it works great in
most applications. If you are harrowing rough ground or hard ground like an alfalfa field, the 16 bar
is certainly recommended.

I've heard of using a harrow for planting.?. Lots of people have used our harrows for planting
cover crops and even grain crops. If you use a spreader truck or airplane to spread the seed, you
can then harrow to incorporate the seed into the ground. It is an excellent way to cheaply put in a
cover crop and for wheat pasture seeding. The same technique applies to herbicide
incorporation.