Morris 10 Series air cart passes the test

Having recently acquired a Morris 9 Series air cart and C3 Contour drill, WA grower Daniel Bradford has been the first farmer in the country to put the new Morris 10 Series air cart through its paces, claiming the new unit offers numerous strengths and benefits for Australian farmers.

Daniel, along with his brother, John, grows wheat, canola and some barley over around 10,000 hectares of leased land at Bunjil, east of Perenjori, in the WA’s northern wheatbelt.

Situated near Mongers Lake, the Bradford’s property comprises red land, gravels and some tough breakaway country through to sandy soils. But despite the dry and difficult conditions, Daniel report the Morris 10 Series air cart – now the biggest in the Morris range – performed well.

“You could definitely tell it was built well,” he said.

Now available across the country, the Morris 10 Series complements the existing 9 Series air carts and comprises seven different models from 20,890 litres up to 34,701 litres. With a robust Aussie-inspired design and a stainless-steel liquid tank, it features load cells under every granular tank to aid calibration, electric metering for accuracy, and rapid fill times via a conveyor. Meanwhile, the use of a Morris ‘Optimizer’ tank ensures the tanks empty together.

The 10 Series frame is a fully boxed and trussed design that incorporates Morris Duraloc interlocking technology carried through from the Morris Quantum air drills, while the tyres used on the largest carts can each carry 26.5 tonnes.

“We also have a 14,000L tow-behind liquid cart and we liked the way we could fill everything up, put high rates of fertiliser out and just keep going for 14 hours,” Daniel said.

He said the load cells remove the discrepancy between calibrated and applied rates by tracking density changes as product is metered, alerting operators to update calibration if desired.

“It should be a given on every airseeder you buy,” he said.

“You could see what was left in your tanks, you could see if you were on your rate and how many hectares there were to go – it’s a godsend.”

Meanwhile the new electric metering system allowed the brothers to sow canola down to 1.5kg/ha, which was a big saving considering the cost of seed.

“The lowest we could get to with our system this year was about 1.9kg/ha,” Daniel said. “We tried to get it down to 1.5kg/ha, but it kept jumping up without our knowledge.”

He said the section control with the 10 Series cart reduced overlap in their program down to about 2-3 per cent, whereas this season their overlap reverted back to more than 10 per cent.

“Over 10,000ha, the reduced overlap saves a lot,” he said. “With the lower rates and the load cells as well, it’s all getting back to maximising your efficiency – that’s what you’re after. Everything costs a fortune to put in the ground, so you have got to get it right and make the most of them.”

Daniel said when filling the tanks on the 10 Series cart, the Convey-All single belt conveyor was extremely quiet compared with rattling augers, while the use of an app to easily set calibrations and avoid the need to go back into the tractor cab was “awesome”.

“It was a big cart and it’s definitely the future of farming,” he said.

After previously using a Bourgault air cart and 3320 paralink hoe drill, the Bradford’s upgrade investment for this season saw them acquire a 23,000L Morris 9 Series air cart and 27-metre C3 Contour drill, which allowed them to sow 400ha over a 24-hour period.

Pulled by a John Deere 9570RX four-track tractor, the C3 Contour is fitted with the tyne assembly used on the Morris Quantum air drills and Daniel said despite limited rainfall, the early crop germinations were excellent.

“We had about 50 millimetres of summer rain, started sowing dry on the 20th of April and then we had 17mm on the 1st of May.”

“The canola all came up. We couldn’t believe the germination with the C3,” he said.