Kirkby Tyres collaborates with Agrovista to demonstrate in-field benefits of low tyre pressure

Kirkby Tyres collaborated with leading agronomists Agrovista earlier in the year, attending its Lamport AgX open day on 3-5 July with its Gallileo CupWheel technology. Lamport AgX is a major resource that looks at many aspects of soil health, including demonstrations and trials. The open day presented an opportunity to meet with farmers and introduce the innovative technology, whilst answering questions from attendees.

Kirkby fit a high-horsepower tractor with a set of Galileo AgriCup tyres and carried out a live field test to show how the tyre design would perform with a drill attachment on the back of the tractor unit. The drill penetrates the surface of the soil to a depth of 12 inches whilst being pulled over 100 meters. Kirkby said the results showed zero slippage, a fact that translates to real world fuel savings, as the tyres help the tractor to run efficiently and to reduce the tyres’ impact on the soil via compaction.

Kirkby said: “We have continued to work with Galileo, the inventor and proprietor of CupWheel technology. We believe that the benefits this technology will bring to farmers will be borne out in the years ahead. the results of yield success rates at different tyre pressures (as part of a four-year study undertaken by Wright Resolutions Limited, a design company specializing in agricultural cultivation and machinery).”

The key findings of the study can be summarised as follows:

• Not running tyres over the field would allow 100 per cent yield.
• Running tyres at 0.5 bar would allow 94 per cent yield.
• Running tyres at 0.7 bar (typical of VF/IF tyres) would allow 70 per cent yield.
• Running tyres at 1 bar would allow 40 per cent yield.

The Galileo AgriCup tyres have been designed to be capable of running at 0.5 bar within field operations.