Farmers get Trimble guidance

Farmers recently took to the classroom for Geraldton McIntosh and Son’s guidance school.

About 30 farmers attended the day in a bid to learn about the intricacies of the Trimble guidance system.

Trimble is the guidance system used in New Holland machines and runs through satellites.

The guidance school focused on the FM-750 display — a new product offered by McIntosh and Son this season.

McIntosh and Son sales manager Brad Forrester said product had attracted a great deal of interest.

“It has a new touch screen and it can work in with variable rate and swath control on sprayers,” he said.

“We have sold a lot of auto-steer systems this year, so there are a lot of people getting into it.”

Mr Forrester said there had been good sales so far this year, because farmers felt confident about the season ahead.

“We’ve had good sales pre-seeding, because there is a lot of moisture in the ground,” he said.

Mr Forrester said most farmers’ queries were about logging and mapping using the Trimble system.

Nabawa farmer Brady Green said the guidance school was a useful refresher course prior to seeding.

“We’ve been using guidance since 2007 but we’re fairly new to Trimble,” he said.

“This helped me to be a bit more familiar with its functions.”

Mr Green’s property received more than 200mm of summer rain and he will start seeding this week.

It was the first time Geraldton McIntosh and Son held a guidance school.

Guidance training will tie in with header school this September.