LORETTE, Man. Ñ The Red River Valley has punishing conditions for field sprayers. When the gumbo is wet, it sucks a sprayer into the mud. When the gumbo dries, it turns rock hard and pounds a sprayer to pieces.
Surface drains are everywhere and are essential on these flat fields, even though they play havoc with sprayers.
Rob Manaigre farms 9,000 acres of this soil, along with his brother Ray and their father Gilles. Every acre on their Lorette farm receives at least two spray applications a year, with some fields receiving three or more applications. They also custom spray about 10,000 acres each year.
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They do all this with just one sprayer and no hired help, often running at night to take advantage of the weather. It asks a lot of any sprayer. There’s no time for breakdowns or getting stuck.
“Around here, 80 percent of the time we’re spraying in muddy fields because we have to spray so much for disease,” Manaigre said.
“We knew for some time that we needed a new higher capacity sprayer, but it had to be lightweight because of the mud. And it had to be reliable. We tried everything on the market, but we didn’t find anything that met our needs.”
Then they read a magazine article about the Cylinderella, a cylinder-shaped sprayer built by Charlie Balmer.
“It looked like a smart idea,” he said.
“We’ve now got three years and 120,000 acres on it and we have yet to see any real problem with the machine. You can’t ask for a better design for a high clearance sprayer.”
The sprayer averages 100 acres of spraying an hour, as Balmer predicted it would back in 2001. It now has 1,500 hours on the clock, with no down time.
“Our farm is spread out over a 10 mile (16 kilometre) radius, so there’s always a lot of road time on our sprayers,” Manaigre said.
It has a road speed of 45 km-h, which means the Manaigres can leave the trailer at home.
“With this long, long wheelbase, you can’t find a better handling sprayer,” he said.
“The ride is very smooth. You let go of the wheel and it keeps tracking straight. There’s no hassle following a straight line in the field or on the road.
Light weight
Manaigre thinks the sprayer’s light weight has a lot to do with its performance and reliability. He said commercially available sprayers with the same capacity are thousands of kilograms heavier than Balmer’s sprayer, which uses the cylindrical tank as the main frame.
For example, he said their Cylinderella weighs 8,500 kg empty, while the new John Deere 4710 sprayers have a 3,600 litre tank and weigh 10,000 kg empty. The same capacity Rogator is also 10,000 kg.
The 1254 Rogator model, with the same capacity as the Cylinderella, weighs 12,600 kg empty, which is what the Cylinderella weighs with a full load. He said that extra weight makes a big difference when working in wet fields.
“We also tried the big Case with the engine at the back, he said.
“With the engine and the boom over the rear tires, it went down the field and it always looked like the rear end was ready to drop out of sight any second. When the tank is empty, there’s no weight on the front.”
He said weight distribution is one of the things they like about their new sprayer.
“We’ve got the cab and the engine over the front and the boom hanging out the back, so those weights never change. Then we’ve got the tank in the middle, so whether it’s empty or full, the weight distribution front to back remains the same Ñ 50:50.”
Handles mud
Manaigre said that in three seasons of spraying, they have yet to get the sprayer stuck. He attributed this to the low weight, even load distribution and hydrostatic four-wheel drive.
The sprayer is powered by a Cummins 5.9 L cranked up to about 220 hp. Drive is through a three-speed hydrostatic with a low range and high range for the front wheels and for the rear wheels.
They spray with one set in high range and one set in low range, which would give them a speed of 29 km-h. However, they always back off a little on the throttle, spraying at 26 to 27 km-h, with power in reserve.
“I’ve gotten stuck enough with other sprayers, but never with this one,” he said.
“There’s no doubt that if we were carrying that extra 9,000 pounds (4,000 kg), we’d be sinking. When we hit the mud, the tires cut a trench just like they would with any other sprayer. But it keeps moving. It doesn’t bog down. I don’t think we could do this with any narrower tires. It’s got the metric 11.2 tires. They’re 270/65R/54; just about right for this sprayer.”
As for the theory that mud and hydrostatic drive don’t mix, Manaigre disagreed.
“We haven’t had any problem with the motors burning out. No hydraulic problems at all.”
Cylindrical frame
The Cylinderella’s frame is a 50-inch diameter tube rolled at a steel plant that rolls the standard-sized 50-inch anhydrous tanks. Four years ago, when Balmer went public with his sprayer, many people predicted that the cylinder would not stand up to the abuse a sprayer frame must take.
“We do a lot of surface drainage in this area,” Manaigre said. “Steep, sharp slopes. We have to do that to get rid of the water.
“When we’re spraying, we hit those ditches at speed. It’s hard on equipment, that’s for sure. So far, there’s no sign of cracking or stress anywhere on this machine. I think this cylindrical frame is the best idea yet.”
Manaigre said they did have trouble with the first boom, an ultra-lightweight 90-foot tubular unit. Balmer replaced it with a heavier 100-foot boom, which has handled nearly all of the sprayer’s 120,000 acres.
Wrong conclusion
In retrospect, Manaigre thinks the original boom may not have been the problem because they upgraded the accumulator on the suspension system at the same time that the boom was replaced.
“The new accumulator has a much larger capacity and we charge it all the way up to 600 psi. Now we hit the ditches at full spraying speed and the boom bounce is gone. It just floats along so smoothly.”
Manaigre has already talked to Balmer about another cylindrical sprayer. They both agree that 5,500 L is the maximum capacity for wet fields, that another 100 hp would be helpful and that a quieter cab would also be a nice touch.
No word yet on when Cylinderella II will roll out of Balmer’s shop.
