Seattle-based agricultural robotics company Carbon Robotics has launched a programme that lets other farm equipment makers connect their implements directly to its autonomous tractor platform, with Kansas-based Great Plains Manufacturing the first partner, Global Agriculture reports.

The programme, Carbon Autonomy Ready, was announced on 1 September and demonstrated the following week at the Farm Progress Show in Boone, Iowa. It publishes technical specifications so that implement makers can build equipment that works with Carbon's driverless tractors without Carbon engineering each integration itself.

Carbon Robotics is best known for the LaserWeeder, which uses computer vision and lasers to identify and kill weeds without herbicide, and more recently for Carbon Autonomy, a kit that converts existing tractors into driverless machines. Until now the tractor could run without a driver, but implements were not integrated with it in this way.

The first implement built to the new specification is Great Plains' HT1100 Terra-Max tillage tool, connected through the company's existing Implement Command system, which already lets the tool's settings be adjusted electronically rather than by hand.

Chief executive Paul Mikesell presents autonomy as an answer to the shortage of skilled tractor operators in North American row-crop farming, saying driverless tractors can extend working hours beyond one operator's shift and get more use out of each machine. The company has not said how many other manufacturers it is talking to or when growers can order compatible implements, but says the specifications can extend to planting and spraying equipment.

Photo: USDA / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Source: Global Agriculture