AUSTRALIAN farmers’ knowledge of Dutch agriculture may be sketchy - focusing on windmills and tulips for the most part - but if one boomspray manufacturer from the Netherlands gets it way, we’ll be hearing a lot more about their expertise with spraying equipment.
Steven Koop, sales manager for Agrifac, whose flagship Condor model is one of the market leaders in Europe, said the company was looking to build its brand in Australia.
“We’ve sold a couple of machines and we’ve been going around field days and doing promotion and we’re getting quite a bit of enquiry,” he said.
Mr Koop said the machine’s key advantage over its rivals is its stability, allowing an even application of chemical.
“The Condor uses our StabiloPLus chassis, which is designed specifically for self-propelled sprayers and can run smoothly across uneven surfaces.”
Mr Koop said the big benefit of this was keeping the booms stable so there were less issues with spraying from higher than optimum levels and possible drift.
“Vehicle movements are not passed on to the boom, which is obviously what you are looking for in terms of getting an even application.”
To help with this, there are also three different steering settings, front wheel steering for road transport, four wheel steering for use in paddock and crab steering, which can be used on undulating ground.
The Condor is also light in comparison with other self-propelled sprayers and combined with a weight bearing system designed to share the load equally across all four wheels, it keeps ground pressure to a minimum.
And contrary to Australian preconceptions, the machine size is comparable with common sprayers in Australia.
“Even though there is much less land available in Holland, farmers do operate on a large scale with machinery to match what you see here.”
Mr Koop said he believed controlled traffic growers would also like the adjustable track width, that could allow the growers to set the machine up according to their own tram track system.
Ground clearance can also be adjusted.
Ideal for producers of crops such as canola and beans, which can often grow tall and require late season chemical applications, such as insecticides in the beans, the Condor Clearance Plus system allows the machine to be lifted to get greater clearance.
