Deutz-Allis 385

I have heard nothing but great comments on this planter. Some say it is still one of the best planters ever made!! Was this Allis Chalmers technology that was gunna be a orange planter or was this something Deutz had going on?? Ryan

We ran the prototype - orange - had 78 and 74 units inbetween.  Dave Murray _ still with Agco- was the project engineer.  Unit had some problems early on - mostly scrapers not heavy enough in sticky mud.  First openers wore out too quick and were thickened on leading edge. Landoll came out with a cast aluminum hopper bottom that was almost a necessity.  Unit needed a White air system to be nearly perfect.  Later units also had alternate leading edge coulters  to prevent side draft.  Problem with unit was AC had 80% market share in no-til market which was only 20% of the total market. Lou Swoverland was the head of planters - drove him nuts when they (Deutz) woild not give him a frame to go after the 15" row double crop market - instead they went after the 80% of the market they had NO market share in.  Miserable failure - sold the planter to Landoll and went with White.  The lack of a narrow transport narrow row planter plagued  both planters till recently - White has a central fill unit .  May the Quadradisc RIP. Len Schriver wrot the marketing specs for the QD unit BTW - you should have heard him chew on the DA guys. 

Thanks for the inside scoup tbran!! I hear nothing but great things about the 385. I wonder about repair parts?? Ryan

Never did ask the model number of the planter I was helping Jim rob parts off of out in the rain today but it was a green DA planter.  Was mostly picked over but there was a few good parts left on it yet.  Jim thought it was a low houred planter.