Planting is finished. Before you park your planter for the year, at a minimum:
1.) Refresh whatever marking system is used to identify which hydraulic hoses go to each SCV on the tractor.
2.) Lower the planter onto road transport blocks/locks before disconnecting hydraulic hoses. If a hydraulic hose or valve leaks or fails during storage, the blocks/locks keep the hydraulic system from getting out of phase. “Out of phase” means you go to the shed next spring and find one side of the planter fully raised and the other side sitting on the ground.
3.) Take the pressure off all mechanical down-pressure springs, bleed the air pressure from all down-pressure air bags or de-pressurize any hydraulic down pressure system.
4.) Plug or cover all openings to air vacuum/blower manifolds to keep birds and varmints from building nests in those tempting tubes. Put rat poison in main frame tubes, especially any main frame tubes that carry electrical wiring harnesses.
5.) In the cab, jot down in the owner’s manual or a notebook all the calibration values, swath control pre-sets and other programming information in case some electronic gremlin wipes out that data.
6.) Clean out all the snacks, candies and aspirin in the armrest storage box. They’ll be stale by the time you use the tractor again on the grain cart – and most definitely clean out any on-board refrigerators or coolers.
