Chain Diker Draft and Power Requirements

Chain diking is a novel method of forming basins on flat-tilled land to decrease runoff. An instrumented tractor was used to measure pulling requirements of both cropland and rangeland chain-diking implements. Three cropland units were tested in two soils at four speeds, and one rangeland unit was tested at three speeds. Draft per meter of width to pull the cropland chain dikers was not significantly influenced by speed and averaged 0.95 kN/m. The influence of model width or soil type on draft per meter was negligible. The predicted drawbar power required to operate a chain diker at 8 to 9 km/h was 2.1 to 2.4 kW/m. Energy required for pulling was 2.64 kW•h/ha per meter of width. The rangeland diker is used in combination with a disk chain to provide tillage, land smoothing, and basin formation for rangeland seedbed preparation. Draft of the diking chain was 0.46 kN per blade of the disk chain; this accounts for 20% of the force to pull the disk-chain-diker. Draft was not significantly influenced by speed. Predicted drawbar power was 3.2 kW/blade to pull the disk-chain-diker at 5 km/h. Energy for pulling required 14.46 kW•h/ha per blade.