When a farmer inherits, rents or purchases land, he often gets the pivots that go with it. While that can be a real advantage, it can also lead to challenges that come with managing and operating multiple center pivot irrigation brands.

In south-central Nebraska, Brian Petersen faces those challenges every day as he grows corn, soybeans and some specialty crops. Not only does he deal with rough, sandy soil, but he also has multiple pivot brands all spread over a 30-mile radius.

There are often multiple people working with different brands of pivots and control panels daily, which leads to many phone calls, frustration and wasted time.

“I field a lot of questions about all of that different technology,” Petersen says. “We have some older mechanical panels, newer computerized panels, and everything in between. I have to stop and think about each one, how it works, and problem solve quickly.”

Petersen works with Valley_® irrigation expert Jeremiah Johnson of Central Valley Irrigation in Holdrege, Neb., who presented the new Valley ICONX smart panel as a potential solution to these issues.

The ICONX is one of the new Valley ICONTM smart panels, and it works with any major pivot brand. It gives growers the ability to bring pivots of every brand into the AgSense® or BaseStation3TM network for full remote control and management capabilities, but without the cost of a full panel upgrade.

Petersen opted to try the ICONX on a more distant Reinke machine that was on the brink of being replaced. The old mechanical panel on that irrigation pivot was very basic, with only on/off and forward/reverse controls at the panel.

The ICONX used the existing panel’s circuits and bypassed them with updated technology that offers control either on the full-color, intuitive touchscreen display at the pivot, or through the AgSense ICON app that Petersen uses on his smartphone.

Petersen says that updating the panel on the old Reinke machine allowed him to put off updating the entire pivot.

“The ICONX brought my outdated pivot into the twenty-first century,” he says. “I didn’t have to replace the pivot for the time being. Instead, I could update it less expensively.”

This was Petersen’s first experience with using telemetry for remote management and control, mostly because he resisted paying for a subscription for years. However, he tried AgSense with his new smart panel and found that programming and monitoring from his phone opened a whole new world.

“I can program my pivot, and even change the end guns from the road so I can see where they’re turning on and off,” Petersen explains. “I also know exactly what’s going on in the field, without having to drive there twice a day.”

Since the ICONX was successful on his Reinke pivot, Petersen plans to install more of them on some additional older, more distant irrigation machines. By bringing more pivots into one network, he hopes to gain better consistency of control, eliminate mechanical error, experiment with variable rate irrigation and even simplify fertigation.

“We do a lot of fertigating, so it will be very nice to start and stop the fertilizer pump, and keep watering as we do it,” Petersen says. “I like that kind of control.”

As Petersen found, there will always be challenges from using various pivot brands, but new farm technology can help growers bring them into one network for simpler control and management, saving frustration and valuable time.

“I can spend that time doing more important things, like being with my family. 

To experience the entire Valley ICON story, visit valleyICON.com.