Deere + Company

Kevin D McKee

Brian A Ahlschwede

Charles W Formwalt, Jr

Wendell D Reece

David E Brandon

Gary L Warnsholz

Picking unit drive structure for transversely adjustable row units of a cotton harvester. A hydraulic drive system with an engine driven pump supplies fluid under pressure through flexible conduits to individual hydraulic motors located on the row units and drivingly connected to the unit harvesting structures. Flow to the motor is regulated by a flow-control valve and an electronic valve controller to synchronize picker drum speed with harvester ground speed. The hydraulic drive eliminates external drive shafts and significantly enhances transverse adjustment of the row units.

Hydraulic row unit drive for a cotton harvester

A vehicle control system automatically controls both the engine and transmission of the vehicle in response to operator inputs and in response to sensed parameters. The control system has separate selectable operational modes--a constant ground speed mode and a constant engine speed mode.

Automatic engine/transmission control system

An electro-hydraulic control system includes a plurality of two-position control valves, each controlling fluid flow into and out of a corresponding one of a plurality of hydraulic functions. First and second pressure responsive servo actuators associated with each control valve operate to move each control valve to first and second positions, respectively. A two-position, solenoid-operated, pilot valve controls fluid flow into and out of a pilot circuit. The pilot circuit communicates fluid to and from the second servo actuator of each control valve and to and from a plurality of two-position, soleniod-operated, pilot valves. Each pilot valve controls fluid flow into and out of the first servo actuator of a corresponding one of the control valves. A detent mechanism holds each control valve in either its first or its second position in the absence of fluid pressure in the servo actuators. A particular hydraulic function may be actuated by momentary energization of particular solenoids of the rest and/or the pilot valves.

Electro-hydraulic control system

A microprocessor-based transmission control system has both automatic and manual control modes and controls the transmission as a function of engine speed. The control algorithm automatically switches the control system to its manual control mode in response to certain conditions and failure modes.

Transmission controller

A vehicle includes a hydraulically operated multi-speed transmission controlled by a rotary pilot valve and pilot-operated shift valves. An electronic control unit generates electrical control signals for automatically controlling the transmission. A manually movable lever generates mechanical transmission control signals. An interface mechanism includes a sector gear which rotates the rotary valve in response to movement of the lever. A stepping motor rotates the sector gear via a torque-multiplying gear train in response to the electrical control signals. A rotary gear ratio encoder is rotatably cooupled to the rotary pilot valve and generates signals indicative of the actual gear ratio of the transmission.

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Waterloo, IA, United States of America

Kevin D McKee