Patent ID: 8577561

Claim:
A method of controlling a product distribution apparatus, the apparatus having at least one furrow opener and a furrow depth regulation member associated with the furrow opener, a product dispenser operable to dispense product into the furrow, a down force actuator operable to apply a down force to the furrow opener and furrow depth regulation member to produce a desired soil reaction force on the depth regulation member, a sensor to measure the soil reaction force, a controller adapted to operate the dispenser and the actuator and a locating system to determine the location of the apparatus operatively coupled to the controller, the method comprising the steps of: moving the apparatus over a field; dynamically monitoring an output of the sensor and operating the actuator in response to a sensor output to vary the down force to produce the desired soil reaction force on the depth regulation member when the furrow opener is in a first area of the field and disabling operation of the actuator in response to the sensor output when the furrow opener is a second area of the field; and using an electronic field map stored in a memory accessible by the controller and an output from the locating system to determine when the furrow opener is in the second area of the field.