Performance of a Hydraulic Doser Used in Fertirrigation

Abstract

A system that makes the injection of fertilizers in the irrigation water is the one that uses injection pump. This requires adjustment, which can be done depending on the manufacturer's information or a calibration made by the user under real operating conditions, the latter being the most recommended, due to the uneven manufacturing of the equipment.This work aimed to evaluate the hydraulic performance of the Tefen chemical injection pump at different pressures of the system (300, 240, 160 and 60 kPa) and different solutions to be injected (only water, water with fertilizer conventional and water with highly soluble fertilizer).It was concluded that the equipment presents uniformity of work in the situations tested, which maintains an injection pattern independent of the injected solution and that there is linear correlation with high values of coefficient of determination (R²) between the variables of system pressure and injection flow in all the solutions and all the adjustment points evaluated in the injector. Thus it is possible to calculate the injection flow rate of the equipment through the defined equations, for different situations tested.KEY WORDS: calibration; fertigation; injection Tefen. DESEMPENHO DE UM DOSIFICADOR HIDRÁULICO PARA FERTIRRIGAÇÃORESUMO: Um sistema que faz a injeção de fertilizantes na água de irrigação é o que utiliza bomba injetora. Esta necessita de regulagem, que pode ser feita em função da informação do fabricante ou de uma calibração feita pelo usuário em condições reais de funcionamento, sendo essa última a mais recomendada, devido à desuniformidade de fabricação dos equipamentos.Esse trabalho teve como objetivo avaliar o desempenho hidráulico da bomba injetora de produtos químicos da marca Tefen, em diferentes pressões do sistema (300, 240, 160 and 60