Advances in Determining Singulating Seeder Performance: ASABE Standard S658

The advancements in precision planting technologies have been numerous over the last 30 years and the performance efficiencies gained in the accuracy of seed placement by this technology have been tremendous. These advancements have far exceeded the capability of some of the industry accepted test procedures developed over thirty years ago for describing performance of singulated planting equipment. A working group composed of individuals from industry and universities was formed over three years ago to create more modern laboratory test procedures to quantify, for comparison purposes, performance of singulated planting equipment. This working group has completed a successful ballot and the new standard (ASABE S658) for evaluating planter seed spacing performance has been published. This voluntary test standard is composed of three parts: S658-1, Singulating Seeding Equipment Test Methods Part 1: General Information S658-2, Singulating Seeding Equipment Test Methods Part 2: Monitoring System Performance S658-3, Singulating Seeding Equipment Test Methods Part 3: Seed Spacing Performance The X658 working group as part of the ASABE MS-49 Crop Production Systems, Machinery, and Logistics Committee believes there is a need to communicate and introduce the details of these test procedures to the ASABE community so that going forward these procedures can be used when comparing the performance of these systems and thus minimizing any ambiguity when communicating performance. This paper focuses on the testing of planter row unit performance (Parts 1 and 3) rather than testing of planter monitor systems (Part 2). In addition to the nuts and bolts of testing procedure and analysis in the Standard document, ASABE hosts Excel workbooks that can do all the calculations, plot graphs, and enter the results in the report formats.