Self - Propelled Sprayer or Pull Type Sprayer???

[Don Aberle]

Where is the Threshold for a farmer to decide to go with a Self-Propelled sprayer or a pull type?

# of Acres ? Available tractors? Labor?

What are your thoughts?

[Kevin W. Sweeney]

Although acres and labour are factors in a sprayer decision,I think the tractor track (tramping the crop) is a big concern. For someone like me (700 acres) I still like to spray my own crop and believe that an S.P. sprayer with it's narrow wheels and big booms is the way to go.I really like the 4 wheel Spray-Coupe model from a financial stand-point. The big S.P. sprayer's with their 90-120 foot booms can cover a lot of ground but they are a lot of coin as well.

[Don Aberle]

That is what we hear the most too - tractor and pull type - to much crop tramping. It seems more and more farmers going to the self-propelled -
Say Kevin - if you are loooking for a spray coupe - got a 220 - I will send you an email with the link
Again, nice pictures of the farm

[jeremy gerow]

we want to go to a self propelled just because it frees up a tractor and is faster between farms cause we are spread out in a 40 miles radius

[Don Aberle]

In the terms of freeing up the tractor and the cost of a self-propelled - how many acres do you think is necessary to justify the self-propelled?

[Ray Hewitt]

We own our self-propelled John Deere 4720 with a neighbor of ours that we get along with very well. Between the 2 farms we have 3500 acres and we also do some custom spraying here and there when we fit it in the schedule. It is a pretty good partnership it can be busy at times when both want to spray but it works out pretty well. Our first sprayer was a Ro-gator that we bought from the local coop fo $60,000 and kept that for 2 years and then bought our JD. We bought that sprayer mostly because we were causing too much damge when we spray soybeans for ahids in late july early august. Otherwise we wou,ld probably still have pull behind. We are on the low end of the spectrum acre wise to own a self-propelled sprayer.

[Don Aberle]

YOu have the picture solution - in terms of joining with the neighbor to justify the cost of a self-propelled. I heard the 4720 is a pretty nice machine. With the kind of acres you have - is it better to lease the sprayer then to purchase?

[Matt Folsom]

We run a Fast brand 80' pull behind over about 3000. But our land is flat and straight. If we farmed in the hills I would run SP sprayer less crop damage.

[Don Aberle]

Is the Fast a good unit?

[Hinfarm]

I run a 60 foot boom and 1000 gallon tank sprayer over about 1700 acres per year. I'd like to go to a SP in the worst way but still can't chew a $40,000 machine when my $4500 sprayer is working fine.

[Don Aberle]

It is hard to spend that kind of money when something you have is doing the job. How many times do you spray per year? Possibly look at leasing an older unit.

[Chris Ayers]

Two larger farmers in our area have gone from self propelled units back to pull types. They are stating that the money they are saving buying self popelled units they can purchase 1600 gallon 120' booms with all the precision electronics and still have cash in the bank. At our monthly area farmers meeting the walked us through all the numbers and it was astonishing how much money they were saving. They were investing in things like auto height control, auto boom shutoff , mapping and auto steer all for under the price of self propelled. They also stated that they had not penciled in being able to use the tractor and auto steer and mapping for other application other than just spraying. After leaving the meeting I think it would take a lot to convince me to purchase a self popelled unit. They had both purchased Top Air sprayers and stated they were averaging 12 to 14 mph. Both of these farmers are 8000+ acre farmers.