About Us
We built our first turner over two decades ago to turn the unturnable – Grass seed straw. This long, clumpy and stringy, lightweight material could not be thrown clear of the old-fashioned designs of flails, knives or paddles. These devices would grab the material, wind it around the drum, and stall out, if the friction didn’t catch the straw on fire first.
The founders of Frontier came up with the idea to modify the drum and paddle design so it would also act as fan. Voila, the torrents of air developed by this design blew the material behind and away from the drum solving the problem. We continued working with the US Dept. of Ag, and Oregon State University on their quest to compost this material. Our further tests proved that this same aerating action was highly beneficial in every composting operation. Because the principles of composting have not changed since the beginning of time, Frontier continues this design in every windrow turner we make from the largest to the smallest.
Because these grass seed fields were spread out all throughout the Willamette Valley of Oregon, transporting this large machine became a severe hindrance. Lowboys, permits and other restrictions made moving these machines expensive, clumsy and sometimes damaging. The only logical solution was to create a machine that would become its own trailer. To accomplish this, the frame design needed to be modified to handle the stresses that will be incurred during 65 MPH highway speeds and the grueling act of driving on uneven fields. Both the fifth wheel and rear axle assemblies had to detach and reattach in a simple and timely manner. Once the semi truck drops the turner off, it takes one man twenty minutes to take from the self-trailering mode to the windrow or from the windrow to highway mode. These detachable trailer assemblies have all the lights, brakes and axles to meet highway standards in both Canada and the US. From that day to this, Frontier’s truss design has withstood the stress of bouncing down highways all over North America.
The unmatched mixing ability caught the eye of the soil bio-remediation industry from our beginning. With several process patents, the Frontier Windrow Turner, called the “Microenfractionator” has left its mark on the entire bioremediation industry.
There is very little a Frontier cannot do.
