NEXAT: The All-New Revolutionary 1100-HP Tractor | Harvesting in the Ukraine

Getting early access to real innovations in farm machinery is always a privilege. In the autumn of 2021, we were given the exclusive opportunity to experience a completely new approach to arable farming on location for a two-part short film series. It involved an exciting trip to the Ukraine. The agricultural sector is one of the pillars of the Ukraine economy, with arable farming being the most prominent activity. As in Russia, however, a significant proportion of agricultural products are produced by private homesteads. In contrast, there are also some large agricultural holdings with up to 500,000 hectares of farmland. During our short visit in mid-October 2021, we didn't have much chance to look into the country's typical agricultural landscape. The aim of our trip was to visit two farms that have been chosen as testing sites for the new 1,100 horsepower Nexat wide-span carrier vehicle. We are lucky enough to be the first to report on this new technology. Our film location is around a two-hour drive south of the capital city of Kiev. A Dutchman by birth, Jelle Oostervelt, came to the Ukraine a few years back for an internship and fell in love with this vast country. Today, he works as a farm manager on a 5,000 hectare farm that produces arable crops as well as milk. For three years, some of the fields have been farmed exclusively with the revolutionary 14-meter wide Nexat. The Nexat houses several generators that are powered by two independently controlled 550-horsepower Liebherr engines. The vehicles can accommodate working widths of between 6 and 24 meters, which applies to all the mountable equipment modules for sowing, tillage and harvesting. For plant protection work, they can even handle a 70-meter boom width. The performance data on the carrier vehicle is seriously impressive. Nexat stands for Next Generation Agriculture Technology. The name says it all. This is the first machine of its kind worldwide. The focal point of this new arable farming method is the Nexat, a wide-span carrier vehicle that accommodates the various interchangeable equipment modules. This essentially makes each implement self-propelled, because it no longer requires an intricate chassis unit or framework. Attachments can be built in a much more slimline format, which significantly reduces material costs and charge weights especially. Less weight to shift also means lower fuel consumption and ultimately less wear and tear. The concept and development work came out of the Calvercamp Ideas factory, which has a track record of launching award-winning farm machinery such as the Primos pellet harvester. There is more to the Nexat concept than state-of-the-art engineering though. It represents a sea change towards a continuous use of controlled traffic farming practices to cultivate farmland. In classic CTF, short for Controlled Traffic Farming, the track widths and working widths of each piece of equipment used in the production process are adjusted so that the same tracks can be used for years to come. This reduces unnecessary soil compaction, improves crop growth and yields and keeps production costs under control. The Nexat system pushes CTF to the next level. This is because the wide-span carrier vehicle solves issues that were previously encountered in CTF such as uneven straw distribution. And since the machine uses the same track twice, an additional 50% of track lines can be saved. This leaves around 95% of the field available for growing plants, free from traffic or compaction. On screen now is a Nexat harvesting corn using the Nexco harvesting module. The threshing system has a 6m wide threshing drum built in lengthways. The two sieve pans provide twice the cleaning space of a traditional large combine. The straw is discharged from the machine via two outlets, enabling it to be perfectly distributed across the entire working width. This is now the third harvesting season here in the Ukraine for two of the Nexco systems. They've demonstrated that the throughput is 50% higher than it would be from a traditional large combine. The 22-row maize header with a 70cm row spacing is supplied by Geringhoff. The Ukraine is home to vast amounts of farmland, and the field configuration in many areas is astonishing. On this note, it's worth mentioning that 25% of the world's Chernozem is found in the Ukraine. Many farms in this country have a thick humus layer, often measuring over half a metre in depth, which means they work on some of the most fertile arable land in the world. The other Nexat we've come to see harvesting is working very close by. Kijs Huizinga was also born in the Netherlands and owns a 15,000 hectare farm here. His farm mainly focuses on sunflower and sugar beet production. For the past eight years of the farm's 20-year history, they have predominantly used controlled traffic farming practices. And are now heavily involved in testing the Nexat system all year round. The Nexat has already carried out several thousand hectares worth of tillage and sowing, as well as spraying the sunflower crops. Now it's time for harvesting. Mounted here is a 30-row header with a row spacing of 50cm. The harvesting conditions in 2021 are challenging because the yields are finally back up to a high level thanks to the heavy rainfall they've had following three bad years. The corn in this field has an average yield of 12 tonnes per hectare and the sunflowers 4 tonnes. The field layout was planned in advance using software and the Nexat is now following the tracks. This is to avoid as many unnecessary turns as possible as much as to follow controlled traffic farming practices. Using the Nexat also means avoiding the use of grain carts on the field as much as possible, if the field is allowed. That's why the grain tank and overloading equipment on the Nexco harvesting module have been designed in unprecedented dimensions for a combine. The grain tank holds 36 cubic metres of grain, which is around twice the amount held by the largest combine on the market today. The overloading auger can shift 600 litres per second, meaning it discharges the grain in twice the speed of a traditional large combine. The first functional model was created in 2017 to 2018 and since 2018 the Nexat has been in testing on farms. More units were then added to the pre-series, which for the past three years have been put to work all year round on the test farms and tested for durability. There are also ambitious plans for the future. From next year and the year after, the aim is to have a pilot series of a dozen machines in operation throughout Europe, North America and South America. In addition to the German production site, another one is already under construction in Russia, with a site in North America to follow. Discussions with end customers are in progress, including Eastern Germany. In our next instalment, we'll take a closer look at the current development and production activities taking place at the Kalverkamp headquarters in Rieste, Lower Saxony. We'll also show you some footage of the Nexat carrying out tillage and other work in the Ukraine, as well as how the equipment module is swapped in just 10 minutes. For more information about the Nexat system, please visit the manufacturer's website and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel, so you don't miss part two.