I have the Fimco LG-3025 boomless sprayer with handwand. 3 nozzles. Older model, but the calibration charts in the manual are the same as current. I didn't like it much on the 400 cc atv. 4wd ATV was always hard to steer and maintain constant speed, and tank made it very tippy, I strapped weights under the atv frame, and put a couple bags of fertilizer on the front rack, and still only ran the sprayer half full. Bought a backpack sprayer and let the ATV sprayer set for a quinquennium.
Now I have a scut, and can mount the sprayer on my carry-all frame, on the carry-all box, or on the cultipacker {I love my cultipacker}. Wired to a dash switch for easy on/off. I am only using the center nozzle due to over spray issues and it's easier to see where I've been from tractor tracks. Works great. I need to develop a one-pass spray technique so I can do specific small areas in my field, and unmeasured areas as foodplots expand.
So I applied the technical part of my brain, which is about 98% of it. Manual says 2.40 gpm at 40 psi. Also says "rate of spray shown in the chart will be the same with 1, 2, or 3 nozzles. Only the width will change". Okay, that's interesting, but not really the target of the discussion. So, I did a spreadsheet {guaranteed results} for desired glyph/acre, spray width of 7 ft, ground speed of ... 5 mph, sprayer output 2.4 gpm and came up with a nice table to get what I want by varying either the total spray volume or the ground speed. Way cool.
THIS IS THE POINT OF THE POST I did the set-up and sprayed 2,4-D on the yard dandelions and had way too much left over. Afterwards I calibrated the nozzle by weighing the output on a scale. It's running .43 gpm at 50 psi, and .39 gpm at 40 psi. Checked it 4 times. No dandelions were injured when running this experiment.
The 2.4 gpm rating seems unreasonable. At that rate you would empty a 24 gal batch in ... 10 minutes. My testing says a 25 gal batch will last 60 minutes. that seems reasonable. Do you guys find that a full batch only lasts 10 minutes? Could some of you'ns measure the output on your nozzles and share what numbers you get?
Since my output is so much lower than expected, I either need to reduce speed to less than 1 mph, or mix my batch at a very high concentration, or plan on covering the same spot twice. Or maybe 3 times. And dang it now my spreadsheet is messed up. Or maybe the pump is failing.
Please share your volume calibration info and run time per tank. Thanks in advance for the valuable responses.
