Where to with sprayer technology?

[fudge]

Currently there seems to be a huge proliferation of new sprayer tech, from auto boom control to individual nozzle control to carbon fibre booms. As each layer of technology adds cost I was wondering which features will stand the test of time? What are the limitations, e.g. how fast is it sensible to travel? How much weight is too much? In short what's the ideal sprayer? Personally I think the industry has been very slow to adopt direct injection. This prejudice may have something to do with my recent struggle to get cheap flufencet out of the can......

 

[Andrew]

In Aus they are using machine vision to identify and spot spray weeds at something like 20kph, reducing chemical needs drastically. Combine that with direct injection, no tank mixing, no cleaning, much lower weight. Never done any spraying though so there must be a reason it doesn't work

 

[Steevo]

Personally I think the industry has been very slow to adopt direct injection.

Couldn't agree more. Saw the article in FW this week about closed pesticide transfer systems and thought why waste money on all that jobby when moving to the next stage of direct injection would be a huge step forward for the operator, bill payer, and the environment rather than just solving a problem that doesn't really exist other than in regulations. Direct injection on the other hand would have a very quick uptake.

 

[Brisel]

In Aus they are using machine vision to identify and spot spray weeds at something like 20kph, reducing chemical needs drastically. Combine that with direct injection, no tank mixing, no cleaning, much lower weight. Never done any spraying though so there must be a reason it doesn't work

I used one of these rigs in Aus in 2000! A shielded 18m hood with 2 spray lines. One running glyphosate constantly, the other with Garlon for woody weeds running on IR cameras in 3m sections.

Direct injection is great in theory. Lincs Field Products had a Househam sprayer set up to do this for the thousands of acres of vegetables they sprayed. Nothing more than basic washing out - just water & water conditioner/adjuvants in the tank. The kegs for individual chems added a tonne to the side of the sprayer & took another operator to prepare/clean. When it came up for renewal they didn't get another one!

Until law forces the manfuacturers to do this I don't see them agreeing on a common system. The engineering of washout facilities is pretty challenging too. You're short on spray line mixture priming too.

What will last? GPS, until the satellites fall out of the sky at the end of their lives. Are they being renewed??

 

[D14]

I used one of these rigs in Aus in 2000! A shielded 18m hood with 2 spray lines. One running glyphosate constantly, the other with Garlon for woody weeds running on IR cameras in 3m sections.

Direct injection is great in theory. Lincs Field Products had a Househam sprayer set up to do this for the thousands of acres of vegetables they sprayed. Nothing more than basic washing out - just water & water conditioner/adjuvants in the tank. The kegs for individual chems added a tonne to the side of the sprayer & took another operator to prepare/clean. When it came up for renewal they didn't get another one!

Until law forces the manfuacturers to do this I don't see them agreeing on a common system. The engineering of washout facilities is pretty challenging too. You're short on spray line mixture priming too.

What will last? GPS, until the satellites fall out of the sky at the end of their lives. Are they being renewed??

The simple answer to this and ultimately where we will end up is GM crops.

If you think about it around the world there are millions of farmers spraying chemicals out of inadequate nozzle technology. It's bad, really bad in my view. GM will reduce chemical use drastically and where the job will end up globally.

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

What will last? GPS, until the satellites fall out of the sky at the end of their lives. Are they being renewed??

Yes. Pretty regularly actually. None of the original GPS birds are in active operation. They are mix of generations or "blocks" and get renewed fairly frequently. The latest batch apparently have a 15 year design life.

http://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/space/

Since 2000 when the US government un-fudged the civilian signal, its been built up year on year to be ever more important and is now a critical national (international?) infrastructure. It's really now too big to fail and so important and "embedded" that any self respecting up and coming world "power" has either announced or built their own system.

The Galileo system goes into initial operation in the new year. Better late than never!

 

[Clive]

Currently there seems to be a huge proliferation of new sprayer tech, from auto boom control to individual nozzle control to carbon fibre booms. As each layer of technology adds cost I was wondering which features will stand the test of time? What are the limitations, e.g. how fast is it sensible to travel? How much weight is too much? In short what's the ideal sprayer? Personally I think the industry has been very slow to adopt direct injection. This prejudice may have something to do with my recent struggle to get cheap flufencet out of the can......

I think where its really going to go with the next few years is away from tractor or self prop machinery and to drone enabled crop protection - this will be the ideal sprayer, sub 100kgs or flying above maybe and not alway using chemicals to control problems (lasers or mechanical weed pulling etc)

I have a feeling that the next big sprayer I buy could well be my last

 

[Brisel]

The simple answer to this and ultimately where we will end up is GM crops.

If you think about it around the world there are millions of farmers spraying chemicals out of inadequate nozzle technology. It's bad, really bad in my view. GM will reduce chemical use drastically and where the job will end up globally.

Hmm. The Americans are now back to the same herbicide use as they were pre GMHT thanks to resistance in the weed population. The tonnage used did drop significantly for a while though. I don't see spraying ceasing any time soon. GM would reduce the annual workload, if we can sell the idea to the consumer.

 

[Power Harrow Pilot]

Which of the sp sprayers use the same skid units? Amazone and agrifac look very similar, and landquip use Househam. Any others linked???

 

[Brisel]

Challenger use Chafer packs but I believe that they have started designing their own abroad.

 

[Cowabunga]

Yes. Pretty regularly actually. None of the original GPS birds are in active operation. They are mix of generations or "blocks" and get renewed fairly frequently. The latest batch apparently have a 15 year design life.

http://www.gps.gov/systems/gps/space/

Since 2000 when the US government un-fudged the civilian signal, its been built up year on year to be ever more important and is now a critical national (international?) infrastructure. It's really now too big to fail and so important and "embedded" that any self respecting up and coming world "power" has either announced or built their own system.

The Galileo system goes into initial operation in the new year. Better late than never!

So now we have three active systems in operation. I thought that Galileo was switched on last week and will have its full complement of satellites some time next year.

Anyhow, we now have the American GPS system, Glonas and Galileo. So plenty of choice and increasing accuracy into the future. Until the next war, when it will all be limited to the military.

 

[fudge]

Does GPS really improve spraying that much. My hand driven tramlines are about 30cms too narrow according to my calculations any savings would take a loooong time to accrue. When autonomous cultivation is possible I can see a big pay off, but I wouldn't be comfortable with agri Chems going on un accompanied in case of mechanical failure.

 

[Cowabunga]

Does GPS really improve spraying that much. My hand driven tramlines are about 30cms too narrow according to my calculations any savings would take a loooong time to accrue. When autonomous cultivation is possible I can see a big pay off, but I wouldn't be comfortable with agri Chems going on un accompanied in case of mechanical failure.

Not everyone has tramlines. Not everyone sprays cereals.

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

So now we have three active systems in operation. I thought that Galileo was switched on last week and will have its full complement of satellites some time next year.

Anyhow, we now have the American GPS system, Glonas and Galileo. So plenty of choice and increasing accuracy into the future. Until the next war, when it will all be limited to the military.

I believe the 4 launched last week give them the minimum number to go into "initial operational capability". That should hopefully bring 7 trackable sats (generally in view) and 15 total in orbit in the constellation sometime early next year, once they've completed testing and ground station works(?). You're right the full strength complement wont be ready until about 2020 if all their future launches go to plan.

Re war. Who knows I think that would be the least of our worries. The DoD infamously "degraded" the civilian signal in the gulf wars. The impact to the general population and industry was pretty insignificant at the time, but would they do it now? A lot of other stuff could come seriously unstuck?? Google and Tesla for example wouldn't be too happy with their driverless cars potentially put at serious risk, airliners plotted of course, ships, not to mention stock markets which use GPS for timing etc. There are also lots of other GNSS alternatives for the 'bad' guys to use now.

Edit - probably be 4 or 5 trackable soon rather than 7 (getting carried away!). Generally can "see" about 1/3 of whatever number total is in orbit. Can track only 3 right now ;-(

 

[Brisel]

The cost/benefit of GPS varies with how you view overlaps. Double dosing isn't necessarily wasted unless you get scorch or unharvested lodging but you'll be underdosing the rest to allow for the overlaps. The capital requirement for the equipment can take a long long time to be paid back for the occasional user or very quickly for more expensive passes on a well used big bit of kit.

 

[fudge]

The cost/benefit of GPS varies with how you view overlaps. Double dosing isn't necessarily wasted unless you get scorch or unharvested lodging but you'll be underdosing the rest to allow for the overlaps. The capital requirement for the equipment can take a long long time to be paid back for the occasional user or very quickly for more expensive passes on a well used big bit of kit.

Get rid of the driver and it makes sense on any scale! Not spraying without an operator is a bad idea IMO.

 

[Andrew]

Until the next war, when it will all be limited to the military.

5 minutes after the start of the war we'll all be dead!

 

[Brisel]

When the machine turn on us?

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

When the machine turn on us?

If you believe Mr Hawking, yes.

 

[fudge]

If you believe Mr Hawking, yes.

He is to be believed on AI but is that a problem for the business owner?