INSIDE OUR COMBINE HARVESTER INNOVATION FIELD TESTS
When harvesting season begins, it’s not just our customers heading out for work. Joining them are CNH's Combine Harvester Innovation teams. Across Europe, North America and South America, the teams embark on field tests to put our latest technology through its paces. And to establish how we can keep our machines at the forefront of the industry.
It’s no small operation: last year a convoy of 17 trucks ventured to just France and Germany.
“It’s like being in a Formula 1 racing season,” says Bart Missotten, who leads CNH’s harvester innovation globally from our base in Zedelgem, Belgium. Drawing upon over 25 years of experience at CNH, he directs his teams as they develop new technologies for these (somewhat slower) machines.
Bart Missotten, Global Harvester Innovation Leader, CNH
This process begins long before they get out in the field. Firstly, they take ideas from a variety of sources, including customers, suppliers and marketing. What follows is design, lab tests and simulations – all to work out how different solutions could be applied to our products. The teams are at the cutting-edge of agriculture technology. They help build a road-map for future customer success. Unsurprisingly then, their work is closely protected to shield fresh ideas from major competitors.
Through close collaboration with leading researchers at universities and labs across the world, Bart’s teams have brought vision technology, AI and radar to combine harvesters. These automation systems scan the grain in real-time as it’s harvested and precisely measure the quantity of chaff in the mixture. The radars are sensitive enough to detect tiny, straw particles amidst the clouds of dust in the field and instruct the spread rotors to slow-down or speed-up accordingly.
As the improvements keep coming, customers are getting better yields and a better return on their investments.
“Our biggest challenge has always been to increase capacity,” says Bart. “Some regions only have the right harvesting conditions for three weeks. So, there is an enormous hunger to get the maximum performance out of these machines.”
The field test stage is a crucial part of meeting these demands.
“By driving the machine yourself in the field you get a clear view on what's working and what’s not. It’s very difficult to appreciate the behavior of the machine from just looking at a graph on a PowerPoint,” says Bart.
Dré Jongmans, Combine Harvester Innovation Manager, CNH
A One Team effort
Bart stresses the value of his multidisciplinary teams. Collaborating on-site are not just engineers and computer specialists, but real farmers with first-hand knowledge of harvesting crops. There are senior company figures working alongside interns, who often arrive through the company’s strong links with technology universities.
Dré Jongmans, Combine Harvester Innovation Manager at CNH, agrees: “Our varied team allows us to tackle many different problems. They are long days out in the field, but very rewarding as we learn a lot. They bring us together – I can’t think of many better teambuilding activities.”
It’s a love of testing that binds everyone together. A tireless desire to reach the best possible solution for our customers out in the field.
“And once you have driven the machine you get the bug. There's no medicine for that,” Bart adds.
The harvester teams follow the crops as they mature across the season. When they finally finish, they return home with plenty of insight into how we can continue to Be the Best. And possibly one or two fond memories…
“My favorite moment comes after a whole day of testing, when we drive the machines back to the farm in convoy. As the sun sets over the fields, you can look back and say: ‘that was a good day.’”
