Test method for field sprayer inspection at the farm level
Méthode d'essai pour l'inspection de pulvérisateur grandes cultures au niveau de l'exploitation
Résumé
Field sprayer behaviour has an important influence in pesticide application (efficiency of chemical and wastes). Some methods were developed and are applied in several countries to check the sprayers at the farm level and help the farmer to spray better. In some countries these tests are reglementary. One crucial parameter of the evaluation of the behaviour of sprayers is the evaluation of boom movements which induce unevenness of deposit. Methods to analyse this point were developed in several research laboratories to characterise the mechanical behaviour of the sprayer and/or to measure or predict effects of boom movements on the distribution. These methods are sophisticated and they cannot be used in field conditions. Thus at this moment, proposed tests don`t include this evaluation. With this objective, a European project (SPECS : European system for field sprayer inspection at the farm level) was achieved this year. Several approaches were tried. Among them, the method described here was defined to be used for the inspection of field sprayers at the farm level with acceptable costs and easy technical set-up. Once the method was set-up, tests were organised to verify the ability of the test to answer the objectives and to evaluate its validity and its robustness