Ground-Moving Updates at Kinze

 If you’ve traveled across Iowa on 1-80, you’ve no doubt seen the impressive displays on the campus of Kinze Manufacturing.

These have included the 60' planter extending into the air that pivots from a field planting position to transport position with a four-wheel-drive tractor grounding it; and the nine grain carts, ranging from a 1⁄16 scale toy to a 1,050-bu. wagon, stacked on top of each other.

This picture was taken in 2007.

 Now, the large Kinze sign has a new grain cart mounted to it. The large grain cart that reigned on the tower for many years, was replaced with a new 900 bushel dual-auger, corner auger grain cart. This is the smallest of four highly-styled cart models introduced for 2012.

Kinze introduced its first grain auger wagon in 1971. In 1976, the largest capacity offered by the company was 600 bu., and in 1979 it was 800 bu. And today, the largest capacity grain auger cart built by Kinze is 1500 bu.

If you travel through the area and would like to see the plant, the company welcomes visitors to schedule a tour Monday through Thursday. Click here for more. 

And in January 2013, there will be a new attraction for visitors: the Kinze Innovation Center.

As the company describes it: "The new Kinze Innovation Center describes nearly 50 years of inspiration, imagination and hard work by one man and generations of dedicated hard-working people (Kinze employees, partners, family and friends), who have contributed greatly to the development of modern agricultural equipment to help farmers around the world meet the challenges of crop production and the needs of 7.5 billion consumers worldwide and growing."

 It will be a 25,000 25,000-square-foot complex houses many of the original machines, design concepts and artifacts produced primarily by founder/inventor Jon Kinzenbaw, which will include: Big Blue, the first-ever adjustable-width 12-bottom plow, replica of one of Jon's first business pickups, the very first Kinze Grain Cart, a Kinze-repowered tractor (JD5020), one of the original 24-row rear fold planters, a tractor from Jon Kinzenbaw's personal antique tractor collection (a different one each season), a replica of the original Kinze Welding Shop (Ladora, IA) where it all began.

Innovation timelines (planters, carts, modern manufacturing, seed delivery).

The Kinze Innovation Center is scheduled to open for tours in early 2013. Click here for now.

You can read the story I wrote about Jon Kinzenbaw, the Kinzenbaw family and Kinze Manufacturing here: Engineered Blueprint.