Design Mill, in partnership with Northeast Iowa Community College (NICC) and National Education Center for Agricultural Safety (NECAS), has developed a virtual reality agriculture simulator for safety operations and training.

Using Intel hardware and John Deere expertise, this project developed a framework for an immersive VR simulator encompassing training, operation, and safety procedures for a self-propelled sprayer.  The sprayer is a large tractor with boom arm mounts that can extend up to 150 ft in length to apply fertilizers and pesticides onto row crops.  Heavy machinery can be difficult to operate for new hires and for experienced users looking to utilize the best techniques and safety practices.

The size of the machine, the large wing span of the arms, and the terrain to be navigated are all factors that can put an operator in a dangerous situation with costly consequences.  This project solutioned a VR simulator  to lessen those risks by allowing users to complete virtual and practical training before operating real machinery.