Until you tell them how easy it makes it to bypass emissions restrictions. My tractor was shipped with a screw turned down to <25hp to bypass emissions controls. I could turn that screw back up and have a ~35hp tractor, but of course, that would be illegal and make lots of environmentalists cry.

Opening up John Deere tractors for right to repair virtually assures they will ~all be doing emissions deletes. Part of their lock-down was profit seeking, but the other half is that different vendors had different ideas interpretations of the law about how locked down the system had to be to prevent emissions tampering, and domestic companies more subject to US law were generally far more paranoid about it.

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hatsix 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Right to repair doesn't change any of that. Farmers were adjusting that screw anyways, that was the entire point. I'm not mad at farmers for doing it, I'm mad at John Deere at cheating the system.

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Manuel_D an hour ago | parent | next [-]

The point is that when the firmware was locked down, it was vastly more difficult to bypass emissions restrictions. I'm not sure what you mean when you say John Deere was cheating the system. Arguably they were taking compliance more strictly before this ruling.

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mothballed 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

It's not John Deere that was doing that, just some Korean companies exploring the opportunity and importing to the US. John Deere is located in the US and too afraid of the whimsical interpretations of regulators to try something like that, I think.

There was no "screw" for the commercial John Deere tractors with emissions controls, that I know of, as that was locked down to prevent "repair."

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javawizard 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Lot of armchair quarterbacking going on, on both sides. I'd love to hear an actual farmer weigh in on this.

Anyone in the room care to volunteer?

	▲	mothballed 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		tractorbynet is one of the better forums for info on opinions on tractors by people that use them regularly

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snypher 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

If we could get our operators to just run regen when they should, it wouldn't be an issue. They don't mind filling DEF and we don't mind paying for it.

	▲	trollbridge 6 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		The bigger problem is when the DPF system stops functioning properly. This happens quite frequently, and is (by design) not a user-serviceable system. Then you can't "run the regen when you should". All of this to reduce "particulate" which is not the actual polluting part of diesel emissions, even though it is the part you can see. The polluting part is what you can't see. The EPA changed its rules a year ago to allow measuring NOx emissions (which makes sense) instead of just measuring DEF consumption (which does not make much sense) before forcing an engine into "limp" mode, and in particular retrofitting a system to measure NOx and reflash the computer (including aftermarket solutions to do so) is no longer considered emissions tampering. This should have been done a long time ago.

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triceratops 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I don't understand, are 35hp tractors illegal under emissions rules? Then why even manufacture them and cripple them?

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mothballed 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Tractors are legal above 25hp but it requires DPF, and at I want to say about 75, possibly more than that. Farmers generally hate DPF systems and will disable them the microsecond they get the right to repair.

>Then why even manufacture them and cripple them?

They cripple them because they know people want bigger tractor without emission control so they sell it as a less powerful tractor and then just expect people to break the law and turn the screw, and everybody is happy.

========= re: below due to throttling ========

>Thankfully, it's not illegal to own a screwdriver and nothing changes there. There's absolutely no relevance between right to repair (not right to break emission laws!) and the situation you describe.

There is because on the John Deere tractors you can't set the "screw" unless you have right to repair the engine system. John Deere has no screw because they're in the US and they're too afraid of US regulators.

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spaqin 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Thankfully, it's not illegal to own a screwdriver and nothing changes there. There's absolutely no relevance between right to repair (not right to break emission laws!) and the situation you describe.

	▲	WarmWash 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Well, then there also must not be much relevance between lax guns laws and school shooters? I get what you are (trying) to say, but lets be real here. Right to repair people (myself included) just need to own that it will have some downsides.

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lettergram 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

As a tractor owner. Two things, the DPF & SCR (>=75hp) on a tractor is not a great idea --

1) Tractors are typically owned by low margin businesses (i.e. farmers) that need to be repaired in the field AND need to be repaired quickly, else you loose a crop. Adding complexity to tractors literally can cost the farm.

2) The actual emissions reduced is questionable. Tractors run significantly less than a truck, like 50-100x less often. Further there are at least 2x more trucks sold per year

3) To run the SCR system, the engine had to run hot for like 20 minutes burning extra fuel and required DEF (yet more input costs)

3) The emissions they are trying to reduce with the these are likely not excessively harmful from a tractor; largely because most tractors who need an SCR system is >75hp, which also means they're typically used on a large farm (100+ acres). Which dissipates the risks substantially.

For reference my 2022 Kubota tractor repeatedly had issues with the DPF / SCR system, mostly the software to enforce environmental rules. This lost us ~$20k one year due to the tractor being knocked out for a week (I was mid-cut for 140 acre hay, rained & rotted in the field post-cut).

For reference, I was very much ready to bypass the SCR system, but decided against it to keep the warranty. It had nothing to do about "right to repair", I figured out exactly how to bypass it.

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ori_b 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't understand what you're trying to say. Is this prevented today or not by the denial of the right to repair?

It sounds like you are saying everyone is doing it today, so denying the right to repair doesn't affect the situation.

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mothballed 4 hours ago | parent [-]

If you're a US company the vagueness of emissions law likely prevents a US company from hazarding doing it and instead locking down the repair of their power trains to ensure emission compliance. Korean companies get away with it because they don't give much a shit if they're banned from import, it can always be washed through another foreign company. John Deere can't try that sort of thing since being a household-name US company is their bread and butter for commanding a premium in the first place.

======= re: below due to throttling ========

>You pretty clearly said everyone is currently bypassing this, otherwise companies would not be putting in larger engines.

Everyone is doing it on the import tractors with the screws. They are not doing it with John Deere tractors, which are locked down for emission compliance. John Deere is handicapped by the fact they're located in the US and regulators have more leverage on them to prevent the sort of right-to-repair which would enable emission bypassing.

>Do what? What is not happening today that you think would happen if people were given the right to repair?

What is happening today is people with John Deere are not able to unlock their tractor for repair and turn the "screw" like they can with import tractors. The very first thing they will do once they can "repair" is delete emissions controls. That's a big part of what the farmers were pissed about and why they wanted right to repair, they couldn't "repair" their tractor to not use DPF, etc on their domestic tractors.

	▲	ori_b 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Do what? What is not happening today that you think would happen if people were given the right to repair? You pretty clearly said everyone is currently bypassing this, otherwise companies would not be putting in larger engines. Is that wrong?

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notamario 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

So replacing a part requires DRM but defeating environmental protections is as easy as turning a screw?

Surely I can’t be understanding that correctly given your overall position.

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xgulfie 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Right to repair doesn't mean they'll get the ability to install custom firmware for example, it just means they'll get the ability to flash it with the signed, official firmware. It doesn't mean they can DPF delete, it means they can install a new one if the old one cracks.

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q3k 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Doing that is already illegal and should be enforced using appropriate tools. We shouldn't be relying on unrelated technical measures to enforce laws.