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US 9,807,923 B2Granted
Seed characteristic sensor
AssigneeKinze Manufacturing, Inc.
InventorsMatthew J. Wilhelmi, Courtney N. Achen, Marvin Bachman
Life of this patent
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AssigneeKinze Manufacturing, Inc.
InventorsMatthew J. Wilhelmi, Courtney N. Achen, Marvin Bachman
Estimating the term…
Seed meters, agricultural planters, and methods of planting seed may include a housing defining a chamber, a seed disc rotatably coupled to the housing and at least partially positioned within the chamber with the seed disc adapted to engage a seed, and a sensor for detecting a characteristic of the seed after the seed disengages the seed disc and before the seed exits the seed meter. The sensor may be coupled to a seed chute of the seed meter and may detect a wide variety of seed characteristics such as seed position within the seed chute, seed size, and seed shape. The seed characteristic may be used to adjust operation of the seed meters, agricultural planters, and methods. In some instances, the adjustment may be manual. In other instances, the adjustment may be automatic.
A row unit of an agricultural planter, the row unit comprising:
A sensor for use with a seed meter of a row unit of an agricultural planter, said row unit including the seed meter having a housing with a seed tube extending from a portion thereof, and the sensor being coupled to the seed meter such that the sensor senses a characteristic of a seed after the seed is released from a seed disc within the housing but before the seed exits the seed chute of the seed meter housing and enters a seed tube that is separate from and extends at the seed chute of the seed meter housing, the sensor comprising:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.