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Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

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Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#491

Post by left-struck »

jmward01 wrote: post #59

I want this for cars but to keep the modern powertrain. So an EV without the tracking/touch screens, etc etc. Or an internal combustion engine car that is just simple and efficient (and again, no tracking). I'll take the low-tech but nice features like heated seats and power windows still thank you.

There is a golden era of cars, say 5 to 10 years ago that have things like heated seats but no tracking.

Personally I have a 2019 Mazda 3 which has camera vision all around, radar cruise control and heated seats but no lane assist bumping you around or a cellular connection relaying any information.

The only anti feature it has is that stupid idle stop, but that’s easy to permanently disable. It also has car play but doesn’t have a touch screen.

Anyway I’m not saying you should get this car specially but there are cars out there that are like what you want.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#492

Post by AngryData »

lallysingh wrote: post #388
MisterTea wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But there's more to agtech than driving a tractor around, a lot of what these big integrated systems do (at the high end) is very data driven -- determining where and how to plant, irrigate, fertilize, etc. How difficult is this to implement outside of big ag-tech? I feel that a community of experienced farmers and programmers (or programmer-farmers) could tackle this.

I think this has all suddenly shifted with high-quality programming AIs available. How difficult is this to implement with Claude?

Farmers would be foolish to rely on an LLM because farming margins are too low to makeup for even a small quick mistake. Many farms will profit 1% on investment over 1-2 decades, although year to year yield can vary 30%.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#493

Post by missedthecue »

adamtaylor_13 wrote: post #484
missedthecue wrote: post #416

I wonder how sustainable the business model is. Eventually, you saturate the market with your tractors, and if they work as advertised, they are owned and maintained for decades. A lot of people are out there farming with 60-80 year old tractors. I would suspect most of the OEM parts that need replacing are where most wear and tear is happening (the engine). Those parts come from Cummins, not this startup. In the mea…

Must we sell more than 10,000? That seems like a reasonable check for a small business to take home and go solve some other problem for someone. The thing is, your reputation will get out there. Folks will want to work with you because of who you are; it'll be profitable (in many ways) even if it isn't a 100-year dynasty.

So lay off thousand of employees, shutter a factory, close dozens of distribution centers. Degrowth has real world consequences for real world people, and sustainability is generally good.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#494

Post by drfloyd51 »

woods42 wrote: post #324
adamcharnock wrote: post #134

Up until a year ago I was regularly using a Massy Fergusson 135 [0] (Perkins Diesel version), made sometime in the 1970s. It was wonderful! So amazing to drive and use. Clunky and heavy, but you really really felt like you were using a machine. In low gears, if you put you foot down on the accelerator the engine would roar, and your speed would barely change! And there was no fancy technology in it at all. If I was i…

My grandfather had one of these, though gas powered. It may have been the Ford model, cannot remember, though his was built I believe in the late 40s / early 50s. One story that still makes me laugh, he couldn't start it one day, and asked my grandmother to give him a pulling start w/ their ford diesel pickup. One look and my about 12 year old self just knew she wanted to be anywhere else but there (some foreshadowin…

Never do a job well if you never want to do it again.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#495

Post by dpc050505 »

throwaway27448 wrote: post #306
post-it wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, free, and created in Canada by developers not burdened by American red tape.

I have a hard time imagining that canada has expertise in tractor software. Let's rein our nationalist tendencies in to something that approaches common sense

I jailbreaked my Canadarm to prune my weed plants using a LLM.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#496

Post by rgmerk »

dylan604 wrote: post #325
greedo wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The economics of farming (at least in the US) are brutal. Scaling up is really the only way to make a living long term. Some of this is due to equipment cost (look up how much a combine costs), and some is due to competition. It's not unusual for a farmer to be land rich and cash poor. If you want to see a couple of guys learning how to farm from scratch, visit https://www.youtube.com/@spencerhilbert . Spencer and hi…

I'll check out Spencer's channel. For a comedy perspective, there's Clarkson's Farm or Growing Belushi. Even though they are for entertainment, there's a still a lot of info in those shows to not be written off. However, I'm not as interested in being a farmer at that level. I'm much more interested in the homesteading aspect of farming. I'm not trying to feed the world as much as me and mine and maybe some extra. So…

Good luck, but there’s a reason why subsistence farmers move to city slums as soon as they can.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#497

Post by Loughla »

adamcharnock wrote: post #216
Loughla wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did yours have a foot feed for the accelerator? I've never seen one without a hand feed for the rpm's on the steering column.

Mine and a pedal and steering column lever, so I guess I got one of the fancy ones!

So our main small tractors were a 175 and an 1100. The 1100 had a bucket but I would've killed for a bucket on that little 175. Man that thing was handy. You could drive it through the yard without leaving tire tracks.

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#498

Post by SanjayMehta »

adamcharnock wrote: post #134

Up until a year ago I was regularly using a Massy Fergusson 135 [0] (Perkins Diesel version), made sometime in the 1970s. It was wonderful! So amazing to drive and use. Clunky and heavy, but you really really felt like you were using a machine. In low gears, if you put you foot down on the accelerator the engine would roar, and your speed would barely change! And there was no fancy technology in it at all. If I was i…

Basic models still sell like hot cakes in India. I see them all the time.

https://masseyfergusonindia.com/massey-ferguson/

Re: Alberta startup sells no-tech tractors for half price

#499

Post by azzentys »

This is a great initiative. However, I feel that "no-tech" shouldn't be a target and that isn't necessarily good. Ex. Precision tech helps reduce operator fatigue and increases efficiency with respect to equipment operation time and material used.

This isn't to say that tech can't be shoved in every other panel on the tractor - but hope this drives Big companies towards considering where tech is necessary and where it's not.

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