From page 35
the bottle screw that forms
the centre linkage of your
hydraulic set-up. Conversely,
if the rear share touches first,
raise the rear of the plough by
shortening the bottle screw.
With these adjustments done,
set off for the field. Note that
fixed share ploughs throw
IN THE FIELD
the throw of each pass falling While a reversible plough is a
difficult the ploughing
into the furrow of the
very nice implement to have
operation). This angle is
previous pass.
and cuts the time taken in
adjusted by shortening or
getting the job done, the
This means, of course,
lengthening the levelling box
considerable “unproductive” extra expense is hardly
that constitutes part of the
warranted on a smallholding
travelling between the right
right-hand arm of your
and, in any case, such
and left-hand sides of the
tractor's hydraulics.
field, but is unavoidable with implements are often too big
The third adjustment is to
and heavy for small, older
a fixed-direction plough.
tractors to handle without
The solution, of course, is to
Direction of travel between passes
spend much more money on strain.
Once the plough has been
a reversible plough
correctly set up the skill of
(“omslaanploeg”),
which
is
in
9 7
5
the ploughman becomes
effect
two
plough-sets
in
one,
3
1
evident in the evenness of
the one set throwing to the
right and the other to the left, the result of his labours.
with only one set engaging
Continued on page 39
Final furrow
First pass with the soil at a
time. Thus, with a
reversible plough
8 10
one starts conven-
6
2 4
tionally on the right
Direction hand side of the
of throw
field, but one's next
pass is directly
adjacent to the first
pass, with the left-
Ploughing with a one-direction plough to ensure proper throw
hand-throw set of
ensure that the two shares
their soil to the right, so you
shares engaged.
Reversible plough (”omslaan ploeg”)
plough to the same depth. To are limited in your direction
do this, position the plough
of travel if you are to throw
and tractor on level ground
the upended soil into the
and, while gently lowering the furrows of the previous pass,
plough, note which share
ie, you will always need to
touches the ground first. If it's plough immediately to the left
the front one, lower the rear
of the previous pass.
of the plough by lengthening Assuming your field is square
or rectangular, the easiest and
least wasteful way to achieve
this is to start on the right-
hand edge of the field for
your first pass, then turn left
and travel to the other edge
of the field for your second
pass. Each successive pass
thereafter will bring you
closer to the centreline, with
37
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