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| Yeah, since I think controlling pressure on a section-by-section basis would be off the table (1 pump = 1 equalized pressure without complicated valving, or 5 pumps for 5 sections = $$$$)
It'd end up being along the lines of some sort of valve to modulate flow on a by section basis (if it was a master section valve that was modulating flow, I'd reckon that might work to an extent if that valve had a flowmeter tied to it, and was able to quickly respond with high enough resolution. It'd have to have a flowmeter on the section (and the smarts/monitor to know how many nozzles it is feeding), as otherwise you'd have to have each section to be the same size. But, then it'll likely start pressure spiking as the sections are doing their thing while the rate control is wondering why its flow and pressure were going wonky and not sitting still for a minute.
So, PWM valve on the nozzle would likely be the way to go, or a series of solenoids. It would be neat and probably easier for a second system to handle a base X rate (e.g. 10 gallons/acre as a flat blanket application rate), and then a second monitor/system that'd control the second solenoid for strictly a 40-100% rate (of nozzle) improvement that'd give the VR side of things. The pump still might not understand what is going on without some sort of AI in the background with look-ahead calculations for flow rates or something, but I'd reckon that might be within reason down the road. At least there is some stability in flow rate, and you can change your base+ VR rate by swapping nozzles to a large extent.
Maybe we'll look back in a few years to this thread and be like "Oh man, it was way simpler to do X", but until we get someone to spearhead it, might be a little bit before there is enough $$ willing to be spent on a fairly intensive system. | |
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PWM system with per-nozzle rate control
