Using the NMEA output into a rover guidance/logging program (FarmerGPS) I’m troubled by the fact that the antenna sits above the ground and as the vehicle rolls on hills the antenna is no longer over the ground track of the center of the vehicle. To a lesser extent pitch does the same thing, but is of no real significance to my use. The big boys, John Deere and company, have a setup to enter antenna height, location on the vehicle, distance behind to the implement, etc. So when I run over a terrace or hillside I’m not planting where I want to be. Now if I had a 40 foot wide implement I would only have a width error every 40 ft, but I also wouldn’t be using an inexpensive GPS! With an 8 ft planter I have a gap or overlap every 8 feet and it looks bad as well as making room for weeds or having a bad plant population. Now I could possibly put a minicomputer between the REACH and the program, but REACH already has the appropriate sensors so if the (already busy) programmers could add the correction before kicking out the NMEA data it would help a lot and wouldn’t require sending roll and pitch data to the logging/guidance program. A simple height input and corrected output at a minimum. Thanks
Lawrence,
This is a good idea! I can not promise that it will be implemented in first priority, but it should be fairly easy to do. As soon as we get the software integration fully working it will be open-sourced and you will even be able to code this correction yourself on Reach.
Thanks for the reply. Lots of stuff can be added if there is time and the skill to do it. As I recall from a few years ago, a neighbor using the John Deere stuff had to pay nearly $1,000 for the code to activate an existing module to turn on or stop which parts of the drill were planting. Another time I was helping him plant and when I lifted the drill to turn the whole screen would send me a message that I wasn’t planting and I couldn’t see where I was driving as the map trace was covered. Exciting when planting at night. Took a whole season to get them to code that in. Not open source!!! Thanks,