Method and System to Control Flow From Individual Nozzles While Controlling Overall System Flow And Pressure
First Claim
1. A system for applying liquid agricultural products to a field comprising:
- a plurality of individually controlled pulse width modulated valves that are configured to emit a liquid agricultural product at a rate based on volume per time;
a controller in communication with each of the valves, the controller being configured to receive multiple flow related individual control values for each valve, the controller being configured to multiply the individual control values together for each valve to create a multiplied value and to divide each resulting multiplied value by an average of all the multiplied values to create a flow factor for each valve; and
wherein the controller controls the rate at which the liquid agricultural product is emitted from each valve based on the calculated flow factor for each valve.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A method and system has been developed to individually control the flow of liquid products from any nozzle within a plurality of nozzles using pulse width modulated solenoid actuated valves residing on a CAN communication network. The CAN communication network has been further developed to manage the high current requirements of the solenoid actuated valves, the large physical length and high number of nozzles used on modern agricultural application equipment and integration and retrofit requirements when used in conjunction with commercially available application rate control devices. The method and system simultaneously controls multiple flow and shutoff related inputs including but not limited to turn radius, nozzle overlap, swath reduction, nozzle spacing, fence row rates, wheel track rates, etc. The method and system will also simultaneously accept one or more external inputs from commercially available application rate control devices where other rate and shutoff inputs may be used, for example, variable rates per boom section based on GIS maps or multiple in-field sensors along the boom. The method and system further incorporates the artificial manipulation of commercial rate controller inputs and outputs to facilitate these individual nozzle control features and benefits without compromising the overall system flow control performed by the commercial rate controller.
84 Citations
40 Claims
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1. A system for applying liquid agricultural products to a field comprising:
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a plurality of individually controlled pulse width modulated valves that are configured to emit a liquid agricultural product at a rate based on volume per time; a controller in communication with each of the valves, the controller being configured to receive multiple flow related individual control values for each valve, the controller being configured to multiply the individual control values together for each valve to create a multiplied value and to divide each resulting multiplied value by an average of all the multiplied values to create a flow factor for each valve; and wherein the controller controls the rate at which the liquid agricultural product is emitted from each valve based on the calculated flow factor for each valve. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39)
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40. A method for applying liquid agricultural products to a field comprising:
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dispensing a liquid agricultural product through a plurality of individually controlled pulse width modulated valves, the liquid agricultural product being dispensed from each valve at a rate that is based upon a duty cycle percentage applied to the valve, the liquid agricultural product being dispensed onto a field at a total rate based on a corporate duty cycle percentage for all of the valves; assigning multiple flow related individual control values for each valve, the flow related individual control values comprising unitless values that are assigned to each valve based upon a condition or parameter, the individual control values for each condition or parameter being proportional to each other; multiplying the individual control values together for each valve to create a multiplied value and dividing each resulting multiplied value by an average of all the multiplied values to create a flow factor for each valve; and setting the duty cycle percentage for each valve based upon multiplying the flow factor for each valve times the corporate duty cycle percentage.
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Specification