ALMOST 14 months ago, HARDI interviewed the Sanford family of Beulah, Victoria, about their new HARDI Rubicon 9000 with a 54 metre HARDI Paragon aluminium boom and H-Select technology.
Now, after an estimated 800 hours of spraying, the Sanford family has used the big self-propelled sprayer through a full cropping cycle.
So HARDI was keen to hear how the machine had performed.
"It has given us an extra 3000 litres compared to the other self-propelled model we used to have," Tim Sanford said.
Mr Sandford, who does most of the spraying on the farm, said that despite having some 5260 hectares of their Victorian Mallee farm in wheat, barley and lentils last season, he found he didn't need to put in any massive spraying sessions on the Rubicon.
Keeping ahead of the seeders did mean some 12 hour days while they were sowing, but even then Mr Sandford was able to get over 800ha sprayed, with breaks to do other jobs on the farm.
"It's nice and quick to fill up so it gets around the paddocks quickly," he said.
While the RUBICON's capacity was a big advantage, the sprayer's boom set-up also made all the difference.
Its 54m coverage delivered a 150 per cent productivity increase over the 36m boom and Mr Sandford found it just as easy to handle.
"The HARDI boom ride is just fantastic," he said.
"I usually sit on 25 to 30 kilometres an hour and everything we used to go over with the 36m boom we can cover at that same speed with our 54m boom."
What really set this big boom apart was having HARDI H-Select nozzle control technology installed.
The computerised and air-activated H-Select manages up to four nozzles per nozzle body, to deliver consistent spray dosage and droplet size regardless of speed variations.
"You always have those corners you wish weren't getting quite so much chemical," Mr Sandford said.
"And the outside of the corners you wish got a bit more."
With H-SELECT compensating for turns automatically, the Sanfords have been free to focus on adjusting the droplet size from the cab, on-the-go.
"Drift is a major concern with chemical use now," Mr Sandford said.
"With H-SELECT we're able to change our nozzles during spraying to better suit the wind conditions.
"If you're just going along and you can see it's picking up a bit breezier, we can coarsen up those droplet sizes and it seems to help with our results there.
"I'd recommend H-SELECT to other farmers just because it does offer a lot more versatility.
"You can speed up, slow down and your droplet size remains the same."
Mr Sandford considers the HARDI Rubicon's combination of capacity, boom size and H-Select technology as a real winner.
"It really comes down to capacity and being able to go that bit further, that bit longer each day," he concludes.
"The capacity is great.
"You can get the spraying done and the H-Select helps with that immensely."
