REGINA – When today’s high-speed, high-pressure sprayers reach the headlands and the operator shuts off the nozzles to turn, there’s often a bit of spray run-on until the pressure winds down inside the boom and the diaphragms in the nozzles close them off.
Arnie Josephson, sales and marketing manager with Brandt Agricultural Products in Regina, said that can spell excessive application, lost product and wasted money.
“In some cases, depending on what type of sprayer, where the solenoids are, how fast you’re going, how much pressure you’re using and how much agitation is used, we found there was air entering the sprayer in the lines and being stored in the boom,” Josephson said.
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“You can’t compress liquid, but you can compress air. So this air is actually compressing. When you shut off the solenoid, the pump’s no longer providing pressure, but there’s residual buildup of pressure in the air. Until that gets down to the level of your diaphragm, it keeps running. It could be 30 or 40, even up to 60 seconds. At higher speeds, if it’s on for 60 seconds, it’s on for almost the whole turn.”
To remedy this problem, Brandt engineers designed the Kwikstop sprayer nozzle body to consistently eliminate air from building up in the boom. It accomplished this by having the pickup nozzle raised inside the boom, compared to standard nozzle bodies.
“It’s like a snorkel effect. It’s pulling its fluid from higher up inside the wet boom spray pipe,” he said.
“By doing that, it’s not allowing enough volume of air in the boom to ever build up any serious pressure. At the time you shut off the solenoid, the diaphragm does its job, the pressure’s gone, there’s no residual pressure and it shuts off virtually instantly.”
Josephson said the problem can also be overcome by installing a stiff diaphragm that would shut off even at high pressure.
“The problem with that is, it does not allow any type of extended range on your tip. If you slowed down slightly before the headland, or due to field contours, and your rate controller dropped the pressure to avoid overapplying, you would completely lose your spray pattern,” he said.
“Our solution allows you to use a standard diaphragm, not a high-pressure diaphragm, and get the most range out of your tip. As you slow down and the rate controller drops pressure, you still maintain a full, accurate spray pattern. Then when you go to shut it off, it shuts off when you want it to shut off.”
Run-on is normally not a big problem with older sprayers.
“The slower you go, the lower pressure you use, if you don’t have as many ball valves or as much agitation, you don’t notice it as badly. A guy with an older wheel-boom sprayer travelling five mph (eight km-h) spraying 40 psi doesn’t have as big a problem. A second or two of run-on isn’t going to make a huge difference. It’s more for the bigger guys with higher pressure running at higher speeds.”
The Kwikstop nozzle body is designed to be compatible with all tips on the market.
“It’s not just a Brandt innovation. We want to make this nozzle body technology available for people to use on all types of sprayers. The Kwikstop technology can be adapted to any size of boom.
“Any conventional plastic nozzle body being manufactured could be adapted to the technology. With singles, doubles or triples, it does not change the style of tips you use,” he said.
“The theory is, we’re pulling from higher up in the tube with this extended intake tip inside the nozzle that fits into the boom. The boom diameter is not critical. It’s just a matter of not allowing any air pressure buildup.”
Josephson said a basic combo-jet single body has a list price of $5. The Kwikstop nozzle body adds $2 to a standard body, so adding the Kwikstop option to a 90-foot boom would cost less than $150.
