With arable farmers being forced to rethink their policy on herbicides and dealing with resistance, the timing of the launch of Väderstad’s CrossCutter Disc is no accident. A seemingly minor change, the shallow zigzag action of the new disc could well answer some of the deepest issues. To assess how this plays out in the field we set it to work alongside the time-proven Carrier disc … to see what difference it makes
It is hard to believe the Väderstad Carrier has been around for nearly 20 years and it still has some new tricks up its sleeve. Over the past two decades the Swedish manufacturer has sold the majority of its ‘min-till’ compact disc harrows with the standard 450mm diameter serrated, conical (rather than concave) disc. As one of the market leaders in shallow, high-speed stubble cultivation for a significant length of time, in this role the Carrier comes into its own working at depths of between 4cm and 10cm. But times have changed and the view of many growers and agronomists has shifted towards even shallower working depths to achieve a reliable weed and volunteer chit on the surface without disturbing deeper buried seeds.
But that presents a problem for all standard disc harrows — they rely on running at a certain depth to generate a sideways heave for full surface coverage. Lift up too shallow and you’ll leave strips of completely untouched stubble. And that’s where the new wavyedged CrossCutter Disc comes in. Thanks to its undulating profile it can achieve full disturbance at depths of just 2cm, according to Väderstad. So we set out to put it to the test.
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