31 Aug Superior discs
saving you time and money
What’s Ground Gear’s philosophy on soil engaging parts?
There’s no point in putting a part into the market if the OEM, or importer for that brand, already offers the best quality part available at a reasonable price level.
Instead, we consider where we can offer value. Sometimes its a combination of components that a client might be after i.e. drilling disc, drilling hub and a better bearing sealing system! If the economics stack up we will import it and stock it.
It’s this creative touch that we like to bring to our offering, saving our clients time and frustration, which always equals money rather than just saving $5 – 15 on an after-market part that takes 30 minutes of labour to change if defective and the part fails prematurely in the field, under normal working conditions.
The Ground Gear Way:
Start with the end solution in mind.
We now offer a complete unit, the disc, the hub and a precision machine housing for Great Plains and Allen Custom drilling discs.
Forges de Niaux drilling discs and their benefits
A big difference between drilling discs and primary tillage discs ‘longevity testing’ is sharpness. With drilling discs, the key measure of performance is how long will the drilling disc hold its edge for, Forges de Niaux blades get sharper as they wear!
Having undergone a patented heat-treating process to harden steel, Forge De Niaux seed openers achieve up to 25-30% longer wear than competing openers!
Forges De Niaux drilling discs built with high-hardness 200 kg/mm as proven in the ball test (a specific test used to measure hardness directly and to ensure that the bolt holes won’t break out towards the centre hub.) As measured from a customer perspective the main yardstick the key criteria is: Will the blade retain a sharp cutting edge to cleanly cut residue, eliminate hair-pinning therefore ensuring accurate seed placement.
We are expanding our range to fit as many brands of planting machines and drill brands / seed drilling applications as possible, this is within ‘current supply constraints’ as many in the industry will be aware of.
Machined Drilling Disc hub and Triple Lip (Sealed for Long Life) Bearing.
Our offer is a Hub mounting solution that can be used time and time again, with our hub bearing sourced for absolute leading performance against ingress of fine dust and grit. Save time by fitting the best solution from Day 1 on first change of your drilling discs.
Bearing
Ag-Xtreme bearing with a triple-lip sealing system.
1) Using Seed Xtreme technology in the bearings with triple lip sealing design. Seed Xtreme mud slurry test simulates these conditions 100% of the time, at constant load basis for the full duration of the test.
2) Mud slurry tested up to 250 hours duration in a mud-slurry testing environment to withstand dirt ingress and aggressive soil loading conditions.
3) 250 hours running at 800 Rpm simulates far higher speeds & loading than a drilling disc bearing would typically rotate at.
What is the true cost per hectare?
Some comments from our customers when discussing this subject:
Contractor Input: “ Our main concern with the set up we’ve been previously using until you showed us your hub, was our disc bearings, or disc hubs were failing before the drilling disc was at the end of its useful life’. We were then being supplied the same disc and problem bearing by the OEM under warranty with no improvement in overall parts quality”
Contractor Input “I’ve gone back to pressed steel hubs which are more expensive & harder to source because I’m getting a better run”.
We ask the question, especially of larger scale contractors and farmers, if you pay less for something there’s normally a flip side.
You may save on the initial outlay. But when it comes to fitting the parts, at a contractors’ in house workshop, or on-farm the labour is broadly speaking the same amount but the parts don’t last as long what is the true cost per hectare?
Ground Gear parts can be up to 20% more in initial outlay ($ figures exclude GST) yet considerable savings can still result.
IN PRACTICAL REALITY
The time to change drilling discs is usually up to 2 days or 15 hours labour, regardless of what ground engaging parts are fitted.
- If our housing lasts for multiple bearing changes, then you’re saving a lot of bearings right?
- What is the cost in downtime from premature bearing failure in the field? A collapsed bearing both has an effect on the seeding result as well as time to change.
- The blade lasts longer due to precise gradient hardness throughout the blade from outside edge to inside centre.
More importantly the blade stays sharper for longer through precise hardening on the bevel, the drill has less blockages, opens up the drill slot of high trash situations and saves HP and fuel.
We welcome you to compare this, by running an independent side by side test with Ground Gear parts.
Ground Gear does independent testing every season with clients, so you know for sure in the same drilling conditions or cultivation and soil types that you’re getting true and tangible ‘accurate Per Hectare running costs.
There’s no point making the comparison over 2 completely different seasons. Ie take for example a dry autumn, like Canterbury had in 2021, versus a wet Spring. Soil moisture has some of the biggest impact on wear on ground engaging parts and no two seasons are the same, very dry soil conditions chew through softer parts very fast and can result in very frequent changes or wait times for replacement parts.
DISCLAIMER: Ground Gear doesn’t do free trials unless under exceptional circumstances how ever we will try to match on a limited quantity of parts a more competitive price in order to get direct customer feedback, before and after photos as well as case studies on side-by-side comparisons with comparative parts fitted in neutral positions.
If you’re looking for better hard metal solutions, please talk to us today on 0800 894 171 or click here to email us.