Development and Evaluation of a Combined Cultivator and Band Sprayer with a Row-Centering RTK-GPS Guidance System

Sensors

Manuel Perez-Ruiz¹  Jacob Carballido²  Juan Ag࿎ra² 

[1] Aerospace Engineering and Fluids Mechanics Department, University of Sevilla, Ctra. Sevilla-Utrera km 1, 41013 Sevilla, Spain; E-Mail:;Rural Engineering Department, University of Córdoba, Campus de Rabanales, Edif. Leonardo da Vinci, Ctra. Nacional IV-A km 376, 14014 Córdoba, Spain; E-Mails:

关键词: weed control;    automation;    GPS;    sugar beet;   

DOI  :  10.3390/s130303313

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Typically, low-pressure sprayers are used to uniformly apply pre- and post-emergent herbicides to control weeds in crop rows. An innovative machine for weed control in inter-row and intra-row areas, with a unique combination of inter-row cultivation tooling and intra-row band spraying for six rows and an electro-hydraulic side-shift frame controlled by a GPS system, was developed and evaluated. Two weed management strategies were tested in the field trials: broadcast spraying (the conventional method) and band spraying with mechanical weed control using RTK-GPS (the experimental method). This approach enabled the comparison between treatments from the perspective of cost savings and efficacy in weed control for a sugar beet crop. During the 2010–2011 season, the herbicide application rate (112 L ha⁻¹) of the experimental method was approximately 50% of the conventional method, and thus a significant reduction in the operating costs of weed management was achieved. A comparison of the 0.2-trimmed means of weed population post-treatment showed that the treatments achieved similar weed control rates at each weed survey date. Sugar beet yields were similar with both methods (p = 0.92). The use of the experimental equipment is cost-effective on ≥20 ha of crops. These initial results show good potential for reducing herbicide application in the Spanish beet industry.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.