John Deere has unveiled a fully autonomous tractor ready for mass production.
The presentation took place at a press conference held as part of the CES 2022 exhibition. As noted, the machine was created on the basis of the Deere 8R tractor and was presented with a chisel plow with the TruSet system and a GPS navigation system.
As noted, the issue of providing people with food all over the world is quite acute. By 2050, the world’s population is expected to grow to nearly 10 billion people, causing a 50% increase in global food demand. At the same time, farmers are faced with a decrease in agricultural land, a lack of qualified personnel, as well as external factors – climate change, soil quality, pest invasions, weeds, etc. All this creates serious challenges, especially in the most critical periods of the agricultural year.
To help meet these challenges, a new autonomous tractor is designed to help you farm efficiently even in the toughest conditions. The tractor is equipped with six pairs of stereo cameras, which allows you to detect obstacles in all directions (360 degrees) and calculate the distance to them. The images taken by the cameras are classified using a neural network, and when an obstacle is detected, a decision is made whether the car should continue to move or stop. The position of the tractor is constantly monitored with an error of less than 2.5 cm.
As noted, it is enough to deliver the tractor to the field and set it up for autonomous operation. The machine is started using the John Deere Operations Center Mobile app. At the same time, there is no need to be in the field to control the operation of the tractor – all processes can be monitored through the John Deere Operations Center Mobile, where real-time video, images and data appear. With the help of the application, you can adjust the speed, depth of tillage and many other parameters. In case of any deviations from the normal course of work, the user is notified, which allows you to immediately make remote adjustments to optimize machine performance.
The tractor will be available for order in the US later this year.