TOP 5
Ever since Lely was founded, the company has been driven by innovation. It has patented thousands of inventions, although many haven’t been implemented and they’re often difficult to understand. However, the best inventions are often the simplest ones.
Simplest
inventions
Anybody who keeps animals, whether a single house cat or a stable with 1,000 pigs, has to deal with the disposal of urine and faeces. For farmers, draining and spreading slurry (a mixture of urine and faeces) was always complicated by clogged pipes and pumps until the 1960s. In 1958, Cornelis van der Lely invented the vacuum tank with spreader plate. Using air pressure to spray the liquid slurry from a tank against a simple round plate created a neat fan shape. Stones, lumps and straw posed no problems. The disadvantage is that, along with the manure, it spreads the stink really well!
Contemporary hay rakes that rake hay and grass together are mechanically complicated. They’re comprised of lots of moving parts and have to be driven by a tractor. The hay rake devised by Lely in 1948, and improved in the following years, is different. It consists of just a few large vertical iron wheels that are driven by the ground, and can be pulled by a horse. This inexpensive and extremely robust design from the 1950s is still being built virtually unchanged.
The Lely Astronaut milking robot has changed significantly in the last 25 years. What hasn’t changed, however, is the ‘astronaut system’, which means that the teat cups are always remain connected to the arm (mother ship) via a simple string. This prevents the teat cup from ever falling on the dirty floor, and the system sucking in dirt. Maintenance is also simple and can be done by the farmer personally: simple cut a new piece of string to the right length and tie a knot in it.
The Lely Vector is the most popular automatic feeding system, in part because it’s the only system available that adapts to the feed needs of the herd. That means the farmer doesn’t have to adjust the system settings in different circumstances, such as a change in the size of the herd or different appetite. A simple laser beam measures the height of the feed in front of the feed fence, after which the system calculates if feeding is necessary. The simplicity of this system is reflected in the fact that it was built and programmed by an engineer in just 2 days, since when it has remained virtually unchanged.
The Lely Discovery is attractively priced, partly due to its patented simplicity. Basically, the patent is for a robot vehicle with a slide and only 2 wheels. This patent forces the competition to use more wheels, which makes their products more complex and expensive.
TOP 5
Simplest
inventions
Ever since Lely was founded, the company has been driven by innovation. It has patented thousands of inventions, although many haven’t been implemented and they’re often difficult to understand. However, the best inventions are often the simplest ones.
Anybody who keeps animals, whether a single house cat or a stable with 1,000 pigs, has to deal with the disposal of urine and faeces. For farmers, draining and spreading slurry (a mixture of urine and faeces) was always complicated by clogged pipes and pumps until the 1960s. In 1958, Cornelis van der Lely invented the vacuum tank with spreader plate. Using air pressure to spray the liquid slurry from a tank against a simple round plate created a neat fan shape. Stones, lumps and straw posed no problems. The disadvantage is that, along with the manure, it spreads the stink really well!
Contemporary hay rakes that rake hay and grass together are mechanically complicated. They’re comprised of lots of moving parts and have to be driven by a tractor. The hay rake devised by Lely in 1948, and improved in the following years, is different. It consists of just a few large vertical iron wheels that are driven by the ground, and can be pulled by a horse. This inexpensive and extremely robust design from the 1950s is still being built virtually unchanged.
The Lely Astronaut milking robot has changed significantly in the last 25 years. What hasn’t changed, however, is the ‘astronaut system’, which means that the teat cups are always remain connected to the arm (mother ship) via a simple string. This prevents the teat cup from ever falling on the dirty floor, and the system sucking in dirt. Maintenance is also simple and can be done by the farmer personally: simple cut a new piece of string to the right length and tie a knot in it.
The Lely Vector is the most popular automatic feeding system, in part because it’s the only system available that adapts to the feed needs of the herd. That means the farmer doesn’t have to adjust the system settings in different circumstances, such as a change in the size of the herd or different appetite. A simple laser beam measures the height of the feed in front of the feed fence, after which the system calculates if feeding is necessary. The simplicity of this system is reflected in the fact that it was built and programmed by an engineer in just 2 days, since when it has remained virtually unchanged.
The Lely Discovery is attractively priced, partly due to its patented simplicity. Basically, the patent is for a robot vehicle with a slide and only 2 wheels. This patent forces the competition to use more wheels, which makes their products more complex and expensive.