Boom or non boom sprayer

[Rio_Grande]

I am going to build a sprayer for our gator, currently we have 4 rows in 12 feet then a drive then another 12 feet on the other side. So 12 foot boom on each side will get the plants from above, I have read about 2 nozzle systems that can cover 24 feet without booms but they spray close to the ground.

Has anyone had any experience with the later.

 

[Deerherd]

I bought a boomless for my gator this year and would sell it cheap. It was OK when spraying if it was dead calm and when the plants were really short. Once the soybeans got tall it became useless because like you noted, it was too low. Mine has three nozzles and it works good if I turn off the two ends and use the center nozzle to spray the grass in the middle of the gravel drive.

For some good ideas on building your own, look at Crop Care sprayers.

 

[OldMcDonald]

RioGrande, Remember that conventional spray nozzles for ag type sprayers have a spread width of 50cms when the spray tip is 50cms from the ground and they are set at 50cms centres so that there is double coverage when spraying. That is metric and you will probably find that those 50cms measurements become 18" in the US. The outside nozzles of course go out half their distance with a single coverage. That means you need to spray on the return journey so that your outside nozzle covers the same single coverage to give you the double coverage of the other nozzles. That is standard spraying practice. Your outside nozzles should be far enough away from the plants you do not want to kill when passing them. Be aware also that there is drift, even if only slight, from the spray being applied.

There are various means you can use to reduce drift. I decided to buy rather than build due to the need for extreme accuracy when spraying my young olive trees, and took delivery about 10 days ago. It has not been off the tractor since. The boom has hoods over to keep the spray from drifting with wind turbulence due to forward travel and the effect of spray being applied under pressure. You could rig up a piece of carpet (that soaks up spray) or plastic at the edge of the outermost spray pattern if you want to get real close to susceptible plants. Remember to calibrate your spray too. There is a load of info on how to do that on the net.

I bought a model that also has a hand lance for individual spraying of trees - an absolute necessity to obtain quality fruit of all kinds. Boomless ones are used for similar purposes in large scale fruit growing, but there is an enormous drift problem and you need acreage to let the drift settle without doing any harm.

 

[JimRB]

You are what you eat and you eat what you spray. I have a fear of sprays around food. I probably consume way too many chemicals already because I eat plenty of industrial production food. For our pastures which get sprayed every 5-10 years, we use a boom sprayer with 7 or 8 nozzles to cover a 10' spray. Or maybe it is 12' wide. Too lazy to find a tape measure and spread the sprayer to measure.

 

[jwmorris]

I will point out that I am not spraying crops but turf. My single point nozzle will cover 16' or more, and allow for more overlap around objects that booms will allow. Also don't have to worry about it catching on anything behind you.

 

[Rio_Grande]

This is for spraying insecticidal soap or neem oil, we control weeds by mechanical means and heavy layers like leaves and grass clippings. We are not an organic farm but we only use organic approved pesticides.

Drift isint much of an issue that I am aware of, the neem and soaps don't hurt the plants in this concentration, they just disrupt the feeding, breeding and damage their exoskeleton.

I have been spraying by hand for years, but we are getting too big now. Sounds like wee need to go boom sprayer and I am good with. That just don't want to spend anymore money than I have to lol.