Antonio Carraro has always manufactured tractors with unique points of difference – and a look at the local macadamia industry provides further evidence of this
Describing Tornado Pumps & Sprayers as being simply an Antonio Carraro dealer would be doing a disservice to the history and relationship they share.
The association between the Italian tractor manufacturer and Tornado’s Robert Bianco goes back almost 40 years, when Bianco discovered one of the brand’s unique features – its reversibility – would be perfect for the macadamia industry.
While tractors have naturally evolved since then, Antonio Carraro’s commitment to the tractors being reversible has remained.
As a result, Bianco says Antonio Carraro’s TRX 9900 is the “pinnacle” for macadamia farmers.
Based in the New South Wales town of Lismore – the heart of Australia’s macadamia production – Bianco has both the experience and local knowledge to know what works.
“The striking benefits of Antonio Carraro is the fact they are extremely specialised for orchard and hillside applications,” he says.
“They’re extremely well suited for compact conditions, they are low and they are extremely powerful for their size.
“They have the benefit of reversibility, meaning that their steering and driving position can be changed, which renders them very good for a lot of implements that require a machine that’s concise in size.
“Orchards today are becoming more and more dense in terms of their plant, tree and vine density – land is very expensive and labour is very expensive.
“These tractors are made very small because their row densities in a lot of orchard situations are very tight, so that’s one of the pinnacles of why they work very well in very specialised orchard scenarios – even under igloo type or hothouse type conditions – they’re very strong and very versatile,” he says.
Numbers game
Antonio Carraro’s TRX 9900 is powered by an 89hp (66kW) four-cylinder Kubota engine and offers a 2,400kg lifting capacity.
This makes it one of the more powerful tractors in the manufacturer’s offering, but still comes with the choice of either a rollbar or fully-enclosed cabin while also providing 16 forward and 16 reverse gears.
The TRX in its model name is an acronym, with the letters representing steering front axle (T), reversible console (R) and equal size wheels front and rear (X).
Bianco also praised the tractor’s strength in hillside conditions, with the TRX9900 able to handle up to 33 degrees of incline without overturning, and up to 38 degrees when stopped on an incline.
It is also fitted with the manufacturer’s patented Actio chassis, where the front and rear axles oscillate independently up to 15 degrees, which helps the tractor crawl over uneven ground and keeps it in constant 4WD.
History lesson
To fully grasp the mutually beneficial relationship between Antonio Carraro tractors and the macadamia industry requires delving into the history of the latter, with Bianco and Tornado Pumps & Sprayers being key players.
“Trying to harvest macadamias back in those early days was very difficult,” Bianco says.
“It was all done by hand and there was no real machinery for harvesting, except for a hand rake, bags and a lot of labour.”
A company in the Lismore area saw the benefits of an American machine with small spikes on the wheels which was primarily used to collect golf balls from fairways, Bianco says, and converted this with reasonable success into a macadamia harvester that was paired with conventional tractors.
At the time, Bianco was in business with his uncle and regularly bought products for the macadamia industry from Paul Blassuto, who is now his boss at Tornado.
Blassuto was bringing in Antonio Carraro tractors to Australia, which first exposed Bianco to their unique capabilities such as the reversible driving.
“It’s not the modern thing you see today, but it was obviously a step in the evolution of it,” Bianco says.
“Both my uncle and I saw what it was capable of. We both looked at one another and said ‘we’ve got to build a harvester for this’ because the tractor was reversible with its seat and steering position.
“That’s where it ended up evolving from. We had another man that made the harvester for us, we put it on the linkage and we turned the seat and steering around and we drove into the orchard.
“A year on, and all of a sudden we had a new concept that the industry was able to take advantage of.
“The first three or four machines were difficult to sell because it was a bit out of left field – nobody had seen them before and nobody knew what they were – but if you look at the numbers that are out there today, there are literally thousands of them out there that are doing this exact job.
“The TRX 9900 is the pinnacle of what is sold here because it’s a great package fitted with a macadamia harvester that’s also manufactured here in Lismore.”
Mutual benefit
Antonio Carraro is the only tractor brand sold by Tornado Pumps & Sprayers, given these clear benefits for the industries in which it specialises.
Bianco’s admiration of the Antonio Carraro product – including the TRX 9900 – comes from the considerable and long-term benefits he has seen for the macadamia industry, but also from the experience of dealing with the family-owned manufacturer directly.
“They’re very family oriented, they’re very good people to get on with and the product is extremely well supported worldwide,” he says.
“This is this whole thing about the company – you are somebody to them. I know it sounds a bit far-fetched, but I’ve had the experience.
“I’ve been over to Italy quite a number of times and you’re like family over there when you go over.
“One year I went to the factory and the Australian flag was flying outside because I was there on that day.”
Tornado is also a manufacturer, primarily of sprayers for the macadamia and grape sectors.
Bianco says Tornado’s philosophy is to offer personalised and specific service to ensure their machinery will do exactly what is required – getting maximum benefit from both that machine and the Antonio Carraro tractor it is frequently paired with.
“We want every product to be right for them and we’ve always done that – I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he says.
Antonio Carraro’s full tractor range can be viewed at www.antoniocarraro.it/au
