Improvements of spray applications in greenhouses using hand-held trolleys with air assistance

Hand-held spray guns and lances are the most widely used methods of crop protection in greenhouses despite the heavy workload and high risk of operator exposure associated with these techniques (Foqué 2012). These spray application techniques have also proved to be less effective than spray boom equipment under many conditions while the advantages of using vertical boom sprayers compared with using hand-held sprayers or lances have been widely reported in terms of coverage and uniformity of spray distribution (Sánchez-Hermosilla, 2012). However, problems with penetration capacity have been described with vertical boom sprayers without air-assistance (Derksen 2001). The purpose of this research was to improve spray application techniques in greenhouses considering the spray quality on canopy by using hand-held trolley with vertical boom an including an air assistance system.