How to Choose the Right Nozzle for Agricultural Sprayers
Nozzles used in sprayers are a few highly engineered and précised components. If a spray nozzle has only 10percent wear-out problems, you cannot get the required performance and coverage. Improper selection of nozzle results in a huge expense. Moreover, if you have to re-spray in an agricultural field, performance reduces because of chemical drifts.
To avoid such problems, you must review your spraying requirements. Besides, you have to analyze multiple nozzles for your hand compression sprayers to meet your needs.
Functions of an Agricultural Sprayer
Before you should check the considerations, you must know the functions of a power spray pump for agriculture. These include-
· The number of chemicals you have to apply in an area
· Uniformity associated with an application
· Chemical coverage on targeted surfaces
· Extent of potential drift
Selection of Nozzles based on their Materials
The material/materials used to design nozzles for sprayers depend on the chemical to spray and the budget. A few common materials are ceramic, plastic, brass, and stainless steel. If you want to get a long-term solution, you must choose ceramic nozzles. These nozzles wear longer even though initially cost more.
Selection of Nozzles Based on Droplet Size
Droplets emit from a handy sprayer or portable power sprayer may be of three different types, which are-
· Fine droplets to apply on contact fungicides, contact herbicides, and insecticides, which need enough leaves retention.
· Farmers apply medium droplets on systemic herbicides, fungicides, and insecticides.
· Coarse droplets have found their applications to deal with soil-applied, residual, and systemic herbicides and to reduce spray drifts.
Other Considerations to Choose Nozzles
Whether you use battery sprayers, ULV sprayers, or anything else in the category of sprayers, you have to consider the following-
Content You Spray
The selection of an appropriate spraying nozzle depends solely on the content you will spray. For this, you must check the pesticide label, the required size of the droplet, application rate, and spacing of a spray nozzle. Other than that, you have to check a few environment-related restrictions.
Method to Spray
You will get various types of nozzles to the band, broadcast, direct, or mechanically assist spraying methods.
Drift Tolerance
If your application may drift away from your chosen target, you must look for spray nozzles with low-drift sprays. Simultaneously, one has to follow a few tips for controlling drift-
Reduction in pressure to boost the size of droplets
Use nozzles of large capacity and drift reducing ones to produce relatively large spray droplets
Keep the boom height low
Focus on weather conditions and adjust methods or applications
Weight of the Solution
The specifications of a spray nozzle depend on its content or water. Accordingly, you must use the appropriate conversion factor whenever you spray anything light or heavy.
Speed of the Sprayer
You may operate a sprayer at high speed. However, canopy penetration and spray drift improve only while operating at low speeds.
Conclusion
Overall, you will find varieties of nozzles for sprayers in the market. However, the selection of a nozzle depends solely on what you spray, when you spray, and how you can spray.
Source
Agriculture Sprayers and Dusters by ASPEE Group Of Companies, India. www.aspee.com
Resource Box
American Spring & Pressing Works Pvt. Ltd. popularly known as ASPEE, a pioneer in the field of agricultural equipment, was established in 1946.
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