DROPLETS SPECTRUM PRODUCED BY AIR INDUCTION DUAL PATTERN FLAT SPRAY NOZZLES

Abstract

The spray nozzles manufacturers constantly offer new models in the market attempting to increase the application efficiency; however, the nozzles behavior is often unknown in relation to the produced droplets spectrum. Thus, this work was carried out aiming to evaluate the droplets spectrum provided by the AI3070-015VP and AI3070-02VP nozzles. These nozzle tips have two tilted sprays (30 and 70°) both with air induction. In the spectrum analysis, it was used the laser particle analyzer (Spraytec, Malvern Instruments Co.) which has a 750 mm focal lens. It was built a system to analyze the spray jets produced by the nozzles individually. The spraying technical parameters (DV0,1, DV0,5, DV0,9, Span Index, %V<100 ?m and %V>650 ?m) were performed in four working pressures (200, 300, 400 and 500 kPa). The experiment was conducted in a completely randomized in a factorial scheme (2 x 2 x 4), two models of nozzle sprayer, two fan and four working pressures. For the AI3070-015VP nozzle, the tilted 70° spray produced droplets with coarser volume median diameter (VMD) comparing to the tilted 30° spray, whereas for the AI3070-02VP nozzle, the behavior was the opposite. The nozzles tested showed low drift potential, with %V<100 ?m up to 10.8% when tested in the higher working pressure.