Andrew Watson has won the simple category of the 2022 Farmers Weekly Inventions Competition with his one-pass oilseed rape toolbar.

Mr Watson has created an ingenious front toolbar setup for his Vaderstad Rapid drill so that it can establish oilseed rape crops in a single pass.

The toolbar is a standard Simba ST Bar, which is typically teamed with his X-press disc cultivator.

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However, with the addition of an adaptor frame, he can run it between the tractor and drill to loosen the ground.

Originally, he built the frame for his Merlo telehandler for picking up three-point linkage-mounted implements – a job it can still do.

© Andrew Watson

However, he enlisted the help of local engineer Keith Tallentire to add a lower linkage section so that it would fit onto the ST bar and carry the drill at the correct height.

Some thought went into this to ensure the legs were working at sufficient depth when the drill was on the ground.

The additional length meant the drill’s hydraulic pipes had to be extended, but the control and lighting cables were already long enough.

He pulls the rig behind his 200hp New Holland and it established all of his oilseed rape this season.

It performed well and he says he is pleased with the result, but he did need to set the system discs aggressively to level the furrows created by the ST legs.