Why is there a Defender Blade on an Orchard Rite pole?

So, why would we be seeing a Defender blade on an Orchard Rite pole on one of Royce McKean’s properties?

As I stated yesterday, the simple answer is that there is a new broom coming in terms of noise regulations and like the shrewd businessman Royce is, there is no doubt that he will be hedging his bets to provide options if he finds himself in a tight corner and being forced to actually COMPLY with a noise level.

But that’s not all.

This is an Orchard Rite pole, this is an Orchard Rite supplied engine and control and monitoring system. Royce went with Orchard Rite because  “The length of time they’ve been in business and what they’d be like to work with longer term also contributed to our decision that these are the type of people we want to do business with.”

Yet what have Orchard Rite done lately to move their product forward? Sure there are commercial considerations to weigh up. Can we make it cheaper? Can we provide more coverage? I don’t know if Orchard Rite fans provide any advantage in either of these areas, but one thing is for sure, reducing the noise of these fans has not been Orchard Rites primary focus. They are renowned for being the noisiest of any fans and while some might blame the installer or the owner for turning the fans up to an unreasonable level, Orchard Rites attention to noise has been nil.

While the Amarillo has morphed into the Defender in an effort to get quieter and the already quiet 4 bladed Frost Boss has pushed the envelope with the C-49. What have Orchard Rite done?

Good news.

Their research and development department has been hard at work. They have burned the midnight oil, conducted countless aerodynamic tests and I hear that they used a supercomputer normally reserved for nuclear detonation simulations to finally produce this…

 So what are you looking at?

Well, I’m no expert, but it looks like they took normal blades and extended them by inserting a longer centre section.

Seriously, this was installed next to one of the Marlborough noise hotspots in the Wairau valley. This is Orchard Rites answer to noise problems with frost fans.

For crying out loud. Is it any wonder that Royce McKean is going to risk voiding a warranty on an Orchard Rite frost fan by trying the opposition’s new blade when this is the best that Orchard Rite can come up with?

I can only hope that this is the product of Spanners Watson the retarded South Island mechanic rather than an example of the finest engineering brains of a country that sent men to the moon.

Pathetic.

A single 11 hour frost event is not strange, but this fan is.

Royce McKean and Waiata Vineyards have often annoyed the residents around the Hurunui with their massive installation of Orchard Rite frost fans.

What a marvellous surprise it was to find the following (2007) article in the ‘Fruitfed News’ that espoused the wisdom and foresightedness of Royce in purchasing 53 of the 3000 series Orchard Rite fans for his Waipara vineyard.

This is the same model fan that when measured by Hegley Acoustics in 2005 could only meet the old noise restrictions of the Marlborough District Council if wound down to the point of uselessness. So you can safely assume that they have never been run at this speed and for some reason the residents have complained. The nerve.

But let’s take a moment to have another look at the ‘Fruitfed News’ article again.

What’s that they say?

“The 53 Orchard-Rite wind machines installed on Waipara vineyard this winter have already proven their worth during an eleven hour frost event says viticultural manager Dan Riddell.”

Gosh that’s interesting. You see one of the basic tenants that’s being pushed by the NZ Winegrowers Association is that because the fans are used for such a small amount of time, the disruption to sleep is minimal. In fact during the recent frost fan hearing in Marlborough, figures of less than 10 hours use in a year were submitted by growers.

That must be comforting to know for those Hurunui district residents who suffered through a single 11 hour event. This is not a cumulative total over a season. This is one night. One night without sleep and then back to work the next day. Driving to and from work, operating heavy machinery, trying to make decisions while sleep impaired. ONE night is intolerable. And it’s never just one night is it?

Good show.

What about Orchard Rite? Did they sell Royce a pup? In a quote from the advertising Royce went with them because “Not only were the technical considerations important, but also the philosophies of how the Orchard-Rite people do business. Ultimately, we had a lot of confidence in the key people at Orchard-Rite and that they’d stand behind their products.”

That’s given me a warm glow.

However, it was interesting to note in a picture donated from an interested citizen that Royce has begun testing a different fan up the Wairau Valley. If you look closely on one of his noisy Orchard Rites, you’ll see a brand new Defender blade sitting on it.

Now, to those not in the know, this is taking two competing companies and making their evil love child. To be perfectly honest that’s not fair to the Defender, since in spite of my serious misgivings about this blade and its woeful testing, there would be no doubt in my mind that it would be a generation ahead of the Orchard Rite blade it replaced (not that being less noisy than an Orchard Rite is anything to crow about).

So the question remains, why would you do it?

Well there’s the obvious answer and there’s the one that Orchard Rite would rather you didn’t know.

The obvious reason would be that Royce knows full well that the jig is up and that his current fans are stupidly noisy and are likely to get dealt to by the new raft of Council rules being enacted all over the place.

I will let you know what the less obvious and far more worrying reason is tomorrow.

NZ Winegrowers is your nose growing?

12 July 2010.

It was released in the press that the New Zealand Winegrowers had been told off by the Commerce Commission for telling its members to limit the amount of grapes they harvested.
The commission investigated after receiving three complaints about New Zealand Winegrowers’ conduct during the 2010 harvest.

Apparently the Commission were concerned that the industry group had gone beyond making recommendations about volumes of grapes that were to be harvested and that they had effectively directed growers to harvest only set amounts.

It turns out that this would have been illegal and the Commerce Commission were therefore concerned. They went so far as to issue compliance advice to the New Zealand Winegrowers, which some assumed to be an indication that they had been guilty. However, New Zealand Winegrowers chairman Stuart Smith said he believed the commission’s statement cleared the group of any wrongdoing.

Additionally, Belly Gully (eminent Lawyers that act for the New Zealand Winegrowers) Proudly report on their web site that they have “Acted for New Zealand Winegrowers in relation to the Commerce Commission's investigation into the conduct of New Zealand Winegrowers, as the industry body, regarding grape harvest and wine production levels. The Commission concluded there was no breach.”

This seemed like a bit of an incongruous thing to do. One side (the Commission) says “Bad Winegrowers. Don’t tell growers what to produce.” and then the other side (Winegrowers) says “Good news! The Commission have cleared us of any wrongdoing”.

I for one was confused.

It got better.

15 July 2010:

It was released in the press that The Commerce Commission is offering an amnesty for wine growers (the people who ACTUALLY grow grapes) who own up to colluding over grape prices and harvest yields.

The commission sent New Zealand Winegrowers a letter after an investigation into complaints about the way the group advised members to restrict harvests to meet production targets for the 2010 vintage.

The commission noted it did not have evidence that individual members of New Zealand Winegrowers were setting prices or targets independently of the organisation, but offered immunity from prosecution to the first person to come forward and reveal examples of it happening.

At this point it looks like the Commerce Commission were dredging up a case of sour grapes (everyone loves a pun). I mean what’s going on with the Commerce Commission? Accuse a National body of an illegal act and then offer amnesty for any growers that come forward to confirm it? Frankly it smelled like a fishing trip.

Like any good tale there’s a twist.

Fade back in time……..

5 October 2009:

It was reported in the NZ Herald that “New Zealand Winegrowers has for the first time told wine producers how much fruit to harvest, in an effort to address the oversupply problem. Growers have been told they should harvest no more than 8 tonnes a hectare in the 2010 season. This compares with about 10 tonnes a hectare in the past couple of years.”

The article reports several facets of the reasons why this seemed like a good idea. But I’m pretty sure that the headline for the article sums it up succinctly;

“Winegrowers body sets harvest limits”

So here’s the corrected timeline;

October 2009: NZ Winegrowers appears to direct growers to limit their harvest.

July 2010: NZ Commerce Commission reports that NZ Winegrowers have breached some legal point by telling the growers to harvest a set amount.

July 2010: NZ Winegrowers claim that there was no limit imposed and that (in the words of Stuart Smith) “I do not know why complaints had been made to the commission about the association. Growers had come to the association for guidance after the 2008 harvest created an over-supply of grapes which had damaged the market”

DANGER SPIN ALERT!!

We didn’t tell the growers how much to harvest (like was reported in the press). We just gave them advice when they came to us with a problem.

I think that the smell that the Commerce Commission has picked up is not so much a delicate bouquet that tickles the nose, but a ripe, festering pong that assaults the senses

Apologies to Al Nisbet and The Press

All hail Al Nisbet. I couldn't find the original on-line, but came across the attached perversion of his brilliant original that appeared in The Press a week or so ago dealing with wind farms.

NZ Winegrowers Heads to Court (In the Hurunui and Marlborough)

As reported in the Christchurch press and in rumors coming out of Marlborough. The NZ Winegrowers are appealing decisions to amend noise levels from frost fans to reasonable levels and are heading to the Environment Court to try their luck.
So apart from being told by countless sleep deprived homeowners, apart from being told by acoustic experts, apart from being told by the local Councils, apart from the wine economy dragging respectable (wine-growing) businesses into the mire, they still think that they can make as much noise as they want whenever they want.
They would far rather spend more of the money that they have leached from the growers or have been handed from the government.
Who wins?
Administrators
Lawyers
Red tape connoisseurs
NZ Winegrowers (not NZ wine)

[Late edit]: It would appear that NZ Winegrowers will be appealing the Tasman District Council frost fan rules as well (why should they miss out).