Published by Farmers Guide, March 2007.

Potato equipment benefits from
the latest production technology

Responsible for about half of Scotland's potato production, Angus, on the country's East Coast, has a strong pedigree for innovation when it comes to producing machinery for the potato industry.

According to Gordon Skea of RGS Forfar Ltd, which is based just outside the town of Forfar, there is a very good reason for this.

"The soil around here is very good for growing potatoes, but it has large numbers of stones," he said. "When the issue of tuber quality started becoming more important in the 1970s, growers had to become inventive to produce better growing conditions for the crop."

The answer to the problem was stone and clod separation and a move to raised-bed production, and this has allowed Angus to remain a prime growing area.

"Today about 50% of Scotland's potato crop is grown within 50 miles of Forfar, including large quantities of seed potatoes grown near the coast," Mr Skea added.

One of the early innovators was the Reekie family, which developed, built and exported potato machinery worldwide from the Angus coast from the late 1970s.

The company's stone and clod separators were responsible for farmers all over the world changing to raised-bed systems, and not just for potato production. Raised beds are also now used for growing most large-scale root vegetable crops in the UK and further afield.

Price volatility in the potato sector has resulted in a fair bit of chopping and changing between manufacturers over the years. The Reekie family - which has been running engineering businesses in Angus since the 1950s - sold its potato equipment business some time ago and its designs have been produced by several different companies in the past decade.

"Three and a half years ago, when Netagco stopped trading, I saw a space in the market for stone and clod separators," Mr Skea told Farmers Guide. "That's when I decided to start designing, producing and selling the Scanstone range of stone and clod separators, and bedformers, which was initially aimed at the Scandinavian market."

While the principles behind the Scanstone equipment go back to the earliest Reekie machines from 30 years ago, the design and construction of the machines couldn't be more up-to-date.

RGS Forfar has a combined total of more than 200 years experience within it's full-time sales, service and design workforce, including two designers who are continuously improving the machines, as well as adding new features when required. The design process is completely computerised, which has allowed the latest construction techniques to be used.

"When the drawings are complete, they are passed to Reekie Steeltec Ltd, in Arbroath, which processes them to produce all the steelwork," Mr Skea said. "Using computerised laser cutting equipment, components are cut out of sheet steel in the most efficient way, while computer-operated bending equipment is used to put up to six pre-programmed bends into components like chassis parts.

"We also use a tagging system, where tags and grooves are cut into the steelwork to ensure that adjoining parts fit together without the need for complicated and time-consuming welding jigs. The result is very strong components being turned out with a level of accuracy that would have been unheard of a decade ago."

Reekie Steeltec, which is RGS Forfar's main steelwork sub-contractor, is also responsible for any welding that is required and carries out the painting of components it makes.

"The company has a state-of-the-art paint line that cleans each component with a phosphate spray before rinsing it, drying it and applying a powder coat of paint that is baked on," Mr Skea added. "Much of the steel we use is already zinc coated, so we only need one coat of paint to give an extra layer of protection."

The result of this high-tech approach is that RGS Forfar's stone and clod separators are constructed from about 50% fewer parts than earlier machines and that the work carried out at the company's base can be focussed on assembly rather than fabrication.

"All the parts from Reekie Steeltec, and from other suppliers, are delivered here and stored around the production area," Mr Skea said. "We then batch build the machines three at a time, with about 1,500 parts going into a typical stone and clod separator."

The latest Scanstone machines have dispensed with chains altogether and now use Gates kevlar drive belts. These not only run much more smoothly and quietly than chains, but they need no adjustments after their initial set up.

Hydraulic operations are all controlled by electro-hydraulic valves (wired together with looms from a local supplier) and another nice touch is the grouping together of greasing points by running pipes from easy accessible grease nipples to each bearing.

Production at RGS Forfar is currently running at about 100 machines/year, evenly split between separators and bedformers, although Mr Skea said that it would be possible for production to double in the existing facilities. About 35% of production is exported, with Scandinavia, France and Mauritius - where the separators are used to make beds for growing sugar cane - all representing major markets.

"Sales are increasing year-on-year and we expect a good 2007 because of improved potato prices," Mr Skea said. "We'll also be looking to add export sales in New Zealand and Australasia in 2007, after making inroads in the Czech Republic and Estonia in 2006.

"We have to keep moving ahead and we're currently developing a separator with 20% more capacity. It will not be any wider than our current models, but will be longer so that it can travel faster and still provide the same, top-quality result."

The first of the higher-capacity machines will be on trial this year and are likely to go into full production in 2008, and RGS Forfar is also working on producing smaller models which it feels will better suit some of our overseas markets.

"The fact that we use computer-aided design and have the skills of Reekie Steeltec close by means that we can easily produce prototypes of new machines and test them fully before committing to a full-scale production run," Mr Skea said.

Machines to suit all producers

RGS Forfar Ltd currently sells four separator models under the Scanstone brand. These are made up of web-only or combined web-and-star machines available in either 1,540mm or 1,740mm working widths.

Gordon Skea said about half of the company's customers go for the web-only machine, which provides very accurate separation and is preferred for situations where a range of different crops are being grown.

For heavy conditions, the combined web-and-star separator, with six banks of stars, is the better option, and the Scanstone machines have a novel system where the shafts carrying the stars can easily be dropped out of the unit to replace stars or change their spacings.

Other notable features on the separators include an automatic levelling system for use when working across hillsides and a rotor intake system that keeps soil moving over the webs when working up or down a slope.

The company's bedformers are available in two-, three- and four-row versions, while one- and two-row bed tillers are available for use on heavy land.

In 2006 RGS Forfar started importing trailed and self-propelled potato harvesters from Belgian manufacturer AVR and it hopes to build on sales this year.

The two-row trailed unit is available with an 8,000kg bunker and has an offset feature so that the tractor pulling it doesn't have to run through the crop.

The self-propelled machines are available in two-, three- and four-row versions with the choice of elevator or bunker variants with a capacity up to 10,000kg.

Like all RGS Forfar's machinery, the harvesters are available through the company's dealer network, which includes G&J Peck and Peacock and Binnington in the East of England.