John Deere has provided more information on its recently announced fully autonomous tractor, with the firm expecting only a limited number of deliveries to US farmers this year.
John Deere's autonomous machine was first unveiled on 4 January at the Las Vegas techology event CES 2022.
Since then, the firm has provided more information on the machine, which combines Deere’s 8R tractor, TruSet-enabled chisel plow, GPS guidance system, as well as new technologies.
The 8R410 looks very similar in appearance to a conventional tractor of the series but is equipped with new technology for controlling and monitoring the tractor and mounted excavator.
The autonomous tractor has six pairs of stereo cameras, which enables 360-degree obstacle detection and the calculation of distance.
Images captured by the cameras are passed through a deep neural network that classifies each pixel in approximately 100 milliseconds.
This determines if the machine continues to move or stops, depending on if an obstacle is detected.
The tractor is also continuously checking its position relative to a geofence, ensuring it is operating where it is supposed to, and is within less than an inch of accuracy.
To use the tractor, farmers only need to transport it to a field and configure it for autonomous operation.
Using John Deere Operations Center Mobile, they can swipe from left to right to start the machine.
While the machine is working the farmer can leave the field to focus on other tasks, while monitoring the tractor's status from their mobile device.
The Operations Center Mobile provides access to live video, images, data and metrics, and allows a farmer to adjust speed, depth and more.
In the event of any job quality anomalies or machine health issues, farmers will be notified remotely and can make adjustments to optimise the performance of the machine.
Currently, the technology for the 8R410 is available in combination with a special John Deere chisel plow.
In the coming years, John Deere said it would work on the availability of the technology for further machines and attachments.
Looking at when the tractor will launch, John Deere said a limited number of machines will be delivered to North American customers this year.
The launch of the tractor in Europe is currently not planned, the firm said, as safety regulations currently do not allow the use of autonomous vehicles.
Instead, the machine will be made available only to North American farmers, later on in the year, John Deere added.
