Sprayer ATV Sprayer vs. 3 point Sprayer

[GinNB]

If you're serious about spraying with your ATV you might be interested in my spray rig. 450l tank, high floatation tires on a walking beam axle, 25' booms on 20" spacing, Hypro BigTwin 5200 piston pump, 5hp Honda power via lovejoy, and a foam marker running from the ATV electrical system. Additional cooling for the air-cooled ATV as well. This thing'll outspray my tractors under the right conditions. Speed control is either a bicycle speedometer with the magnet cold-welded to the front wheel or GPS on the handlebars. The trailer is homemade with spindle wheel axles and a wheelstub for the walking beam axle. If anybody wants additional details just ask.

 

[teg]

Sweet rig!!! You win!! I like the trailer idea...


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[Riddler]

Gin, that's a lot of sprayer. Wish you included a picture with the 25' boom in action!! What do you typically apply with that beast??

 

[GinNB]

Glad you folks like it. I don't think I have a pic of it in action though. It spends its time spraying lowbush blueberries with (usually) Velpar to control weeds. Typical travel speed is 5.7km/h and, on bouncy ground, you can see the booms bending as it's flying along. Typical boom length for that design is one nozzle (20") shorter on each boom and it makes quite a difference in rigidity but I like the extra width. The only downside is a shorter life for the hinges, but I've reinforced them and haven't (knock on wood) had a failure since. It has TeeJet DriftGuard 8003 nozzles installed to cut down on operator exposure to drift. The current tow-rig is a 600 Grizzly with a cabin.

Flintlock, you should see if you can zoom in on the hinges for that sprayer if you have uneven ground to spray. Not only do they swing front and back to protect the booms, they pivot vertically in whatever position they're in so that you can shorten the chains to spray in a V-pattern. On one open tractor with an identical sprayer on the 3pt hitch I had pulleys mounted high on the sprayer frame and ropes run to the tractor so that I could pull on a rope to lift a boom to clear rocks, bushes, etc. If you want to order them and make your own booms (not that hard, I custom-made a pair of 5' wing booms for spraying a railroad right-of-way), find a place that sells JB&D sprayer parts and ask for a pair of hinges for their 450l model. Price them before ordering. Seems to me that my spares cost around $150 each, but they're well-made and spring loaded. On a 3pt hitch that sprayer'll spray ground that'll give a mountain goat pause without breaking nozzles. On the trailer that sprayer just floats over quite rough and dippy ground much faster than a full-sized farm tractor can go, but doesn't handle holes, rocks, or stumps well because of the small tires. An obstacle can catch a tire and flip the axle upside down. That, as you can imagine, is a bit of a pain if you're not near a tractor with a bucket to lift the trailer into the air.

 

[EddieWalker]

Gin,

Nice setup. Did you design it yourself, or copy some plans somewhere? I really like the idea of the motor on it too!! That would sure simplify your calculations.

Thanks for sharing your pics,
Eddie

 

[GinNB]

Most of the credit goes to the owner of a farm we've since bought. I had some very soft ground that swallowed tractors when it was spraytime and he had a different trailer with 4 ATV tires on it and started the concept. After he used it on our ground once or twice I had him make an improved version of the trailer for me. Some weaknesses have been fixed and dimensions improved upon (so it's basically a 3rd generation design), but it's basically the same design he came up with based on the walking axle of a blueberry burner. I now have both trailers, but the first one doesn't see any use for spraying since it has little ground clearance and the deck is too short.

If someone wants to copy it, there are two problems with what you're seeing that aren't obvious. One is that the pivot bearing for the walking beam must have a supporting rod to tie the two vertical pieces of plate together. The original design didn't have one and the legs "spread". The other is that a pump must be used that operates when rotated backwards to the direction that a tractor spins its PTO. The IN side is still the IN side when spun backwards as well. It's hard to find a horizontal shaft motor that spins the same way that a PTO does. I don't know if other types of pumps will operate properly but backwards (OUT side provides proper suction) if used with a typical small engine. I wasn't able to find one locally on short notice when the original Briggs with 6 to 1 gear reduction box bit the biscuit (but it turned the "wrong" way too).

Also but not obvious in the pictures is the skidoo ski with a 2" trailer ball welded to it near the back of the ski and a cable attached to the front. Very useful for putting on the trailer and dragging it out of the occasional mudhole when the tow quad was 2WD (not recommended). I can't remember if it's been used since I got a 4WD. That idea was all mine after unhooking when stuck and sticking the tongue of the trailer into the mud like an arrow when I moved the bike to drier ground to pull out the stuck trailer.

 

[EddieWalker]

I was just looking at sprayers in Ebay and saw a realy nice, very expensive trailer setup. It has a thousand gallon tank and hydrualic cylinders on the sprayer arms!!!! It's really cool and I copied every picture of it for my idea folder.

One thing that they had on that setup that I never thought of was a hydraulic water pump. I don't know how it works, or where I can get one, but it would solve allot of issues. I have the remotes on the back of my tractor, so it seems like just a matter of figuring it out!!!

In my mind, I'm thinking of two hoses that will come off my rear remotes. They would go to a hydrualic water pump that I would have some sort of valve on to control the amount of preasure or flow. I set the valve to what I want it to be at a certain RPM on the tractor, and I will have a consistant amount of flow. It makes sense to me, what am I missing?

Eddie

 

[GinNB]

Eddie, go to tractorhouse.com and look at the chemical applicators/sprayers section. They have TONS of different trailed sprayers with different pump and boom options. To the best of my knowledge, most of the "hydraulic" water pumps are regular pumps hooked up to a hydraulic motor. I've been looking for the perfect 750 gallon one for my next boom sprayer. Check out Pulvérisateur MS inc.Pulvérisateur MS inc.. This looks like a particularly sweet boom system:

Pulvérisateur MS inc. - Front hydraulic folding with sliding lift system , width of 60', 66' & 75'

 

[EddieWalker]

I have a dozen pages open right now and I think a roller pump is what I'm looking for. What is a roller pump?

Eddie

 

[Toolguy]

I had a little 15 gal tow behind sprayer I used on my lawn. I never liked it much because it was too small and it was hard to judge the width of the spray pattern. When I bought my Kubota B3030 I started looking for something bigger. I found a closeout deal on a 25 gal ATV sprayer with boom and wand at a Farm, Ranch & Home store. (Similiar to TSC) I made a mount to attach it to the reciever hitch on my 3pt drawbar. I really like it a lot for my just under 2 acre lawn. It sprays a 10' width. My MMM is 5' so after I mow I spray every other mower track and it ends up covering perfectly. No gaps or overlaps. On the other hand, with the spray mixture I use, it only covers 50,000 Sq/Ft, or a little over an acre, on each fill up. I can do my whole lawn in about an hour which is no problem. If I was doing 5 or more acres it would be pretty time consuming. You could make it work alright. It is just a matter of how much time you want to spend on the spraying job. Good luck.