If a guy is building something for personal use, that's one thing. If you are gonna build something and then charge people for the work it does, it better work right. I had to calibrate the sprayer first which meant measuring out an area and spraying water. This gave me gallons per thousand square feet and allowed for figuring how much chemical to add per tank. The first job for the new sprayer was a remote industrial location. Afterwards we parked the sprayer for a week and watched the area to see if there were any problems. This was done just in case I screwed up on my calculations or if there was some type of weird overlap problem. As it turns out the sprayer did just fine and we brought it into the fleet for daily use. "Bringing it into the fleet" is easier said than done.
Anytime we've added new equipment to the truck or trailer there has been a learning curve to get everything to fit. The hooded sprayer was no exception but the extra hassle is well worth it. The unit doesn't do the job any faster than an open boom but it does keep drift to a minimum and eliminates the potential for random over spray on desirable plants. With its foam marker system it also takes the guess work out of overlapping rows. It's also nice to just follow the foam and not have to think about where your last pass was.
I have no experience with other brands of stand on sprayers and I'm not aware of any that are hooded so I can't compare it to other sprayers. The machine does handle a little stiff with the extra weight out front. I expected that and it's actually not as bad as I thought it might be. From the beginning I've had a plan to make it easier for me to handle and that was to make James run it. So far that plan is working out great!
Later.
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