Hey guys, we were out here just flipping tips getting ready to spray some Enlist on our double crop beans, and just thought it’d be a good time to tell you guys a little bit about the nozzles that we use for spraying.
We talk about a lot of different applications in our videos, so I wanted to explain some of the nozzles that we use in those specific applications, so this streamer nozzle is an SJ7. This is the first nozzle we really use every year. We use it to stream nitrogen on wheat. It has seven holes that make seven streams, and it really reduces the amount of burn we get on that wheat in a top dress application.
Second one I want to look at here is a TTI. A Lot of you guys might be familiar with these for Dicamba applications in soybeans. They give you a nice big droplet size, really good at drift reduction, but not really good at coverage, so if you’re using a contact herbicide or a fungicide this is not the nozzle you want to use. You will not be able to get the kill or the coverage that you’re wanting, but for something like Dicamba, or something that’s systemic like that and it can move through where you’re looking for drift reduction you can’t find a better nozzle than these to accomplish that job.
The third one we’re going to look at here is an AI XR. This is kind of our go -to nozzle for most applications. We use it in all of our burn down applications and most of our early post work. It gives you kind of that mix between the fine particle size and the coarse particle size. We’re not getting a mist, but we’re not getting a big rainstorm either. It helps with drift reduction in some ways but is not foolproof on that at all. We still recommend using a drift retardant when using this nozzle, but you’re going to have less drift than you do with a fog type nozzle. Which I’m getting ready to talk about next.
So, both of these nozzles are turbo twin jets. You’ll notice that they’re two different colors. The reason for that is that our gray one here is a larger tip, so it puts out more water per minute or more gallons per minute, where the brown puts out less gallons per minute. Most of the nozzle companies use color coating so you can tell the different sizes, and also they’ll have different angles.
Like this is a 11-440. It’s a 110 degree nozzle, giving you a wider spread pattern over an 80 degree. The gray one we use in Liberty, because we’re putting on higher gallons. We usually use 20 gallons with Liberty, so to maintain speed and not blow the pressure through the roof, we use a bigger nozzle. These turbo twin jets really give you the fogging effect for great coverage and work great with contact herbicides and fungicides. One of the things that is a downfall to these nozzles is the fact that you get a lot of drift, so you’ve got to watch going off target using these nozzles in any kind of wind or a high -pressure situation, but when it comes to contact and you really want to fog that plant, these are great.
We switched to these a couple years ago in our corn fungicide application. We’re now able to get all the way down to the ear leaf and sometimes past, and also in bean fungicides we’re able to blow through that canopy and protect the leaves that really matter down in the middle of the canopy where all your pods are.
The last one we’re going to talk about here isn’t actually a nozzle, but a cap for a nozzle body. A lot of guys don’t use these, but we found that putting these on the nozzle body holes that do not have a tip on them really save us a lot of time and heartache from getting dust, pollen, bugs, anything down in those holes. When we put a new nozzle on, that nozzle comes out, and is plugged immediately. We recommend using these whenever you don’t have a nozzle on there just to save you some heartache later.
Just to close, be mindful of what tips you’re using, what application you’re doing, and what you’re trying to accomplish. Whether you’re trying to fog something, or you really need to focus on drift reduction, there’s a big difference. They’re the same color, they don’t look too much different, but there’s a big difference in the performance of them. So when you get in the cab think about what kind of nozzles you have out in front of you or behind you.
We’ll see you next time out in the field.