[Tellycoleman]

Oh Lord
So I received my spreadermate and was excited to take her on the maiden voyage. I did calibration on my driveway with tennis shoes . Reading over paperwork, with the supplied nozzles , I should be able to treat around 30,000 square feet with one tank. Cool I'm sooooo excited. I have 22,000 and an area in future renovation I was going to spray totaling about 29,000.
I just mechanically aerated and was going to put down more pre-emergent.
Nooooo I couldn't wait on the red nozzles that @Ware told me to use. Noooo I shouldn't take the advice of someone who does it all the time. I'm good. I want to try it.
So I filled up my new sprayer with enough dithiapyr WSB to treat 30,000 square feet. I put in a gallon of Air8 in the mix (which would be slightly under the max rate for 30,000 sqft.)
I then put on my rubber boots ( calibrated in tennis shoes and driveway) turned on my music. And proceeded to walk the walk.
I was walking to 1990's boy band "New Edition". After 6,000 square feet the pressure in the tank started to drop.
What could it be?
Clogged teejet?? Nope
Looked in the tank and it was empty. My heart sank.
So I sprayed 5 times the dose I was wanting to.
Damn You !!! 1990's Boy Band
I was trying to spray 12.2 grams per 1000square feet
And I sprayed 61 grams per 1000sqft. Over 6000 square feet of the side and front yard.

Is there anything I can do?
I guess I'm going to get some serious root prooning.
I guess I will have some seriously Air8 soil. Might be able to breath underground.
I bet I will still get crabgrass :shock: :shock:
Laughing to avoid crying.

I just rolled the sprayer in the corner.
I haven't even put the "Lawn Forum" stickers I got in the mail today.
I am not worthy of them yet

 

[Ware]

With the yellow nozzles? If it makes you feel any better, the reds would have sprayed twice as much. Let me run some math on that 30k claim...

 

[Green]

@Tellycoleman... Ok. I feel your pain. This took guts to post. Hopefully you at least get to have a nice desert or beverage this weekend to take your mind off it.

Anyone (like me) who is still at the novice level when it comes to spraying, can learn from this, though. So Thank you for posting!

I think we should start analyzing what went wrong, so it doesn't happen again!
Bring it on, @Ware !

 

[Ware]

@Tellycoleman what pressure were you at?

 

[social port]

Wow @Tellycoleman . You have an awesome sense of humor.
Breath underground :lol: still get crabgrass

I feel your pain. I bet we all feel your pain.

Last year I monumentally overdosed a section of my lawn with humic acid and kelp. Smelled fishy for two months or better, but I never noticed any adverse reaction.

 

[g-man]

If you haven't watered it, then:

Get your rotary mower out. Place the bag to collect the clippings. Go mow and dispose of the clippings. Then lower the mower height and do it again. Use your car lights to help you see. The idea is to get as much as you can before the rain/dew gets it to the soil.

 

[Tellycoleman]

@Tellycoleman what pressure were you at?

20 psi

 

[Tellycoleman]

If you haven't watered it, then:

Get your rotary mower out. Place the bag to collect the clippings. Go mow and dispose of the clippings. Then lower the mower height and do it again. Use your car lights to help you see. The idea is to get as much as you can before the rain/dew gets it to the soil.

It started raining after the tank emptied

 

[g-man]

Also, the dithiapyr WSB is normally sold in pouches that dissolve in water, how many did you use? How many gallons of water you added?

 

[Tellycoleman]

9 gallon tank
I used 260 grams about 1 and 2/3 pack
I already know what happened.
Music + change of shoe+ the electric slid + not paying attention + over confidence = major mess up.

If someone can benefit from my tragedy then it is worth it. That's why I posted this

 

[Ware]

30k sounded pretty optimistic because I like to spray at a rate closer to 1 gal/M, but Gregson-Clark does say:

...The low drift, low volume nozzles allow up to 30,000 sq. feet of coverage per fill at a .3 gallon/1,000 sq. ft. rate...

I can see how they arrive at that number with yellow nozzles - e.g. if you operated the system at 20 psi and maintained at least 3mph.

That said, with the TTI11002's at 20 psi, I would expect your application rate to fall somewhere between 0.32-0.48 gal/M. You can use the green shaded area of the chart below to estimate how your application rate (in gallons per thousand) would respond to changing nozzle color, pressure, and ground speed.

This is all theoretical of course because it is difficult to measure your actual speed, you're slightly slower walking uphill, etc. How about overlap? On each pass the tip of your boom should be about 10" away from where the tip of the boom was on your previous pass (to simulate the proper 20" nozzle spacing). I haven't used mine yet, but I think that would definitely take some getting used to. Is it possible that your overlap was too generous?

 

[g-man]

9 gallons in 6ksqft with the yellow nozzle at 20 psi? Something is not adding up. 1.5gallons/M? Could you have a leak?

 

[Tellycoleman]

The problem is that I had never owned a battery powered sprayer of any kind. I have been using the wheel driven earth way 25s my entire lawn journey. With the Earthway the slower you walk the slower the spray. I think I returned to my old muscle memory and only snapped out of it when the tank was empty.
I am eventually gonna try again.
Not to. Worried about the Air8

 

[wardconnor]

Definitely blame the 90s boy band.

What were you doing listening to them anyway? 😉

 

[g-man]

Even if you walk at 0.5mph, I don't see how you could get 1.5gallons/M (using the yellow nozzle, 20psi).

 

[Tellycoleman]

Even if you walk at 0.5mph, I don't see how you could get 1.5gallons/M (using the yellow nozzle, 20psi).

Even with 4 nozzles I have the B model?

 

[g-man]

Ok, now it make sense (x4).

 

[Movingshrub]

How slow were you walking?

My backyard is 7000sqft. I am using the yellow nozzles at a higher PSI where I am putting out 0.8GPM. I am using a 12 gallon sprayer. It takes me 15 minutes to empty the sprayer and I've usually walked the entire yard four times, so about 28000 sqft's worth of ground covered.

In the most respectful sense, it sounds like you either were waking super slow, had major overlap and should have covered more sqft at your pace, have a problem with the system, or a combo? Which was it?

 

[gijoe4500]

For next trial calibration, would it be worth just using water and blue dye, and walking the actual 30K, to see how far 1 tank full gets you?

 

[SCGrassMan]

Silver lining - you'll have no weeds there for months!