New farm equipment donated to Iowa State University in December will be used by students to learn the latest technology available on modern machinery.

Kinze Manufacturing Inc. of Williamsburg donated a Model 3500 Twin-Line planter to the ag and biosystems engineering department. The company was represented by Jon Kinzenbaw, founder and president of Kinze, and Susanne Veatch, company vice president.

"ISU is one of the leading agricultural engineering schools in the world," said Jon Kinzenbaw. "It seems only fitting to present this great university - and our next generation of growers and agribusiness professionals - with the same equipment growers are using to take precision planting to the next level."

On-going agreement with company

Also in December, Deere & Co. presented a John Deere 7930 tractor to the ag engineering department. Tony Kajewski, a project engineer in charge of continuous improvement of tractors at John Deere in Waterloo, was on hand to make the tractor presentation. The donation is the result of an on-going agreement with John Deere to provide a tractor of its choice each year.

Ramesh Kanwar, chair of the department, said the planter will be a practical teaching tool in several different machinery coursework venues - such as agricultural systems technology, ag engineering and precision agriculture - as well as in classrooms, on ISU farms and as a demonstration unit in labs.

The tractor will be used in several machinery courses to integrate instruction on mechanical power generation, transmission and traction with advanced training on controller area networks, fault diagnostics, condition monitoring and dynamic control of systems with vehicle communications systems. It also will be used in on-going research in field automation and biomass harvesting and logistics.

"The ag and construction machinery industry is a vital component of Iowa's economy," said Stuart Birrell, associate professor of ag and biosystems engineering. "Agricultural and construction machinery is the single largest export commodity from the state, ranking above corn and soybean and meat products. Our graduates make key contributions to this industry."