Applied Sciences (Oct 2024)

Horizontal Distribution of Liquid in an Over-Row Sprayer with a Secondary Air Blower

  • Piotr Markowski,
  • Zdzisław Kaliniewicz,
  • Adam Lipiński,
  • Seweryn Lipiński,
  • Patrik Burg,
  • Vladimír Mašán

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/app14199036
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 14, no. 19
p. 9036

Abstract

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The aim of this study was to determine the influence of boom height above a crop stand and the spacing between nozzles and diffusers in an over-row sprayer on the uniformity of the horizontal spray distribution and the uniformity of the air velocity distribution. The experimental setup involved a prototype over-row sprayer equipped with a boom with a working width of 8 m and ten air diffusers with spray nozzles. Air diffusers were connected to one or two nozzles each, and they were installed on the boom at intervals of 60, 80, and 90 cm. Terminal airflow velocity at a canopy is determined by the height of a sprayer boom and the diffuser spacing, ranging from around 2 m s–1 to around 27 m s–1. The sprayer boom should be positioned at a height of 50 cm above a crop stand due to the difference between the minimum and maximum airflow velocities. The horizontal spray distribution was more uniform when the sprayer was equipped with hollow-cone nozzles instead of flat-fan nozzles; hollow-cone nozzles should be applied if the distance between nozzles needs to be adjusted to the row width and row spacing. The analyzed coefficients did not exceed 10% when the boom was positioned 50 cm above the crop stand and when the nozzles were spaced 80 cm apart, which suggests that, in this configuration, sprayers equipped with hollow-cone nozzles can also be applied to close-grown crops.

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