Clock ticks down to national Self-Propelled Sprayer Demo day
From an idea mooted within the industry the date of first national Self-Propelled Demo day draws nearer. Running between 10 am and 4 pm, the day will see 14 different self-propelled sprayers gathered together at Bramcote Hall Farm, Warton, Staffordshire, B79 0HH.
With three fields, and 300 acres of cover crop to run in, there should hopefully be enough room for all those booms to be out and about in one place. With the crop tramlined and with safety in mind, there will be just a couple of machines constantly in action per field at the same time. The bonus is a bit of rolling topography and so this should all add up to provide a perfect opportunity to try out the performance of the Pantera 4502 in the field for yourself.
The Pantera 4502 provides power to the four-wheel, hydrostatic drive from a Deutz 6-cylinder, 218 hp turbo-diesel engine via Linde pumps and motors. The final drive is geared through in-board hubs to provide a high-flow, low pressure, high torque drive. The slip of each individual wheel is sensed and the oil sent only to the wheels that can offer the best traction. The engine management system means that revs are provided on demand, whether on the road or in the field, to suit the speed and load thus keeping fuel consumption down to a minimum and enabling a quiet, fuss-free working environment. The hydraulically-driven spraying pumps are equally at home giving full capacity with the sprayer on tick over and so, again, noise is kept down for the operator when filling and mixing.
Steering is either two-wheel in road mode, in which case speeds of up to 50 km/h can be easily achieved where legally possible, or in two-, four-wheel and dog-leg steer in field mode. The dog-leg steer keeps the sprayer uphill when working across sidling ground. Steering angle in the field is automatically reduced with speed to prevent unnecessary boom movement being transmitted via the steering wheel. Full steering is automatically restored when a section is isolated.
The electro-hydraulically actuated suspension keeps the ride height the same, irrespective of the load in the tank or the topography, with oil being sent to the front or back axles to maintain a level machine under all circumstances. The weight distribution of a Pantera 4502 with a 36 m boom is as near to 50:50 as is possible as well as being easily under 11 tons loaded up with all but the tank water on board. The Pantera 4502-H offers another 50cm of clearance for working in tall crops such as sunflowers whereas the standard chassis leaves a clearance of 1.2m depending on tyre size. Track width is adjusted on the move from the cab with a variety of pre-set track widths or to a track width of your choice. The standard Pantera offers track widths from 1.8 to 2.4 metres whereas the Pantera 4502-W goes from 2.4m up to 3.0m for use in cotton, etc.
The Vista cab features an air seat, front and rear sun blinds, adjustable arm rest, buddy seat, climate control, heated and electrically-adjustable door mirrors, cool box, blue tooth telephone connection, auxiliary input for the radio/cd player and excellent 360° all-round vision. But more importantly from a safety aspect, a laminated front windscreen is standard giving the operator more protection in case of accident. Cat. IV filtration is also a cost-effective option to prevent the driver having to use additional PPE when spraying with some products.
The spray pack as such is based around a 4800 litre coated glass-reinforced polymer tank with multiple internal cleaning nozzles and a deep-slung sump which keeps the centre of gravity well down in the frame and also means as little sprayer residual volumes when empty. All told, a 36 m boom sprayer taking into account pumps, filters and spray lines comes out at a little over 25 litres overall, not a lot of wastage when it comes to switching products. The Comfort-Pack I means that the filling, emptying and washout processes are all controlled via the ISOBUS terminal in the cab with the washout automatically sequenced to ensure the maximum effective use of the 500 litres of fresh water on board.
The well-proven Super-L 2 boom offers widths from 21m through to 40 m and with many folding options to suit both farmers and contractors. There is a choice of single spray line or twin depending on liquid fertiliser usage and, of course, now the option of the new AmaSelect or AmaSwitch systems. Height control is carried out by DistanceControl plus with a collection of potentiometers and ultra-sound sensors giving the boom at the optimum nozzle height above target. The height can range from around 40cm through to 2.5m (or 70 cm higher with the optional lift hub if maize spraying is a possibility) depending on the nozzle spacing and the degree of angle of the nozzles selected.
AmaSelect gives the driver the chance to switch between nozzle sizes on the go so that spray quality is maintained irrespective of speed or rate and also a switch can be made between air inclusion, flat fan or fert nozzles depending on the application. In all, a total of 7 switching possibilities per nozzle body can be carried out from the seat. Individual nozzle shut-off via GPS SectionControl and LED boom nozzle lighting is, of course, standard. AmaSelect offers additional savings of around 5% of your chemical bill, over and above what GPS section shut-off already gives through reducing overlap.
We are grateful to the host, Colin Bridgeman, for the use of the land and his facilities and we look forward to seeing you there on the day. There will be catering and facilities available on site all day. Your carriage awaits, but this time its in the form of a Pantera!
Click here for more info on the Pantera
