SINCE spreading is enjoying a farming renaissance - after all, who owned an on-farm spreader 10 years ago? - the focus has been on achieving accuracy and a suitable width of throw.
Just how do you spread urea, gypsum or even super out to 36 metres to satisfy common GPS traffic patterns and do it with a system that is suitable for large scale cropping or pasture businesses?
NSW manufacturer HazeAg reckons it has cracked the code. It has developed a new spreader spinner and approached the bin design with fresh eyes - albeit ones that have been involved in the spreading and fertiliser industry for more than three decades.
The HazeAg trailed 10 m3 Toogong spreader utilises cones over the spinner shaft to spread different products and new design spinner blades that provide an accurate distribution and width.
These elements are complemented by a steeper bin wall design and a one metre wide cleated belt to deliver greater volumes of product to the hydraulically driven twin spinners but at a lower rotation speed.
The machine is versatile, good on chicken litter and granular fertiliser according to company founder, Richard Hazelton.
He said the Toogong spreader was the “culmination of a lot of experience playing around with spinners and blades”.
When spinning the cast blades are designed with aerodynamic properties and create a negative pressure to pull the product into the spinner. “The secret is the shape,” he said.
The second key is the cone that distributes the feed onto the spinners.
“A lot of our development work has been done on a controlled traffic, it has to get to 36m in urea and 45m in single super - if you can catch it in the trays,” Mr Hazelton said.
“No one has achieved that on a wide belt spreader. With a 3PL spreader it can be done because the product drops on to the spinner at a certain point - so they know within a few millimetres where it will land.
“But not all linkage spreaders will get 36m accurately and consistently and that’s why they are looking at the Toogong.
“That and they are always filling them up and that gives us a big advantage over linkage machines because you spend a lot of time filling.”
Mr Hazelton said Toogong spreaders had done about 180,000 acres with urea spreading at 36m centres and have never had a complaint.
The cone helps distribute the fertiliser on the spinner rather than simply dropping it and having the material pulverised. “That allows us to get the width on a wide belt spreader,” Mr Hazelton said.
“What we are throwing out the side we were throwing just as far out the back of the machine. If we change the cone to a bigger version (for urea spreading) it can push more out the sides and less out the rear so we can get the width required,” he said.
“It is very accurate - it’s something that is working in practice, we’ve got the acres behind it and this is better than any graph.”
HazeAg makes a range of bin capacities with the four metre model holding about 10 tonne of single super, seven tonne of urea or 12-14 tonnes of lime.
“The metre wide cleated belt gives you a steeper bin sides with bevelled corners and everything will roll off the sides so they are completely cleared - you don't have to hop into the bin to clear blockages,” Mr Hazelton said.
There’s also an inverted vee shroud running down the centre which takes the weight off the belt. “This makes the conveyor system perform better and means you don’t have to have the belt as tight and so it extends its life,” he said.
The Toogong manages chicken and feedlot manure without tunnelling in the bin. The spreading widths are varied according to the product but spreading is possible simply by changing the spinner cones.
There’s several HazeAg Toogong spreaders in operation including one mounted on the first 3.0 m Multidrive platform ever built that is operating in eastern Victoria.
“We’re just finishing one for a sheep property at Manildra, NSW in very light but steep country and they have made some wonderful suggestions for the chassis design and pull because they get bogged all the time in the wet conditions and often pull the spreader out sideways - it has to be strong,” Mr Hazelton said.
He said the company is focussed on results rather than ruling the market. “We don't want to compete with the big towed spreader market, but our performance is chalk and cheese by comparison.
“If a contractor picks up 20 per cent efficiency they can pay the machine off faster and it’s the same for a big broadacre cropper.”
