In the absence of a major specialist show this season, two rival potato machinery companies chose the Cereals event in June to launch new machines for 2011. Grimme UK and Standen-Pearson have both been working on all-web versions of their popular soilseparators. When Pearson's Megastar was introduced in 1990 its novel approach to potato crop cultivation created a stir and split growers into two camps, those who liked the fine, even tilth produced by stars and those who felt that the resultant beds might lack structure. Twenty years later opinion is still divided and although polyurethane stars are widely used on soil separators throughout the UK, a significant number of operators have stuck stubbornly with web machines. One of their principal concerns has always been running costs. Abrasive soils and those with a high stone content (particularly flint) can be tough on stars; webs last longer and are changed more easily with less down time - a major issue for contractors and those covering a largeacreage or working with a range of different soil types.
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