Design and Development of a Prilled Urea Applicator

Abstract

A prilled urea applicator was designed and developed to increase fertilizer use efficiency. The developed applicator’s aims to place Urea continuously at the subsurface of soil between two rows of plants. A line-to-line distance of 20 cm, depth of prilled urea placement of 5 - 7 cm, and field operating condition at 1 - 1.5 cm standing water (for softening the field) was the designed hypothesis. At the laboratory and farm level, test the developed applicator. The applicator consists of a rectangular frame, two skids and furrow opener, two cylindrical hoppers, and a drive wheel connected with a metering device. The designed applicator was fabricated using PVC, except the push handled (mild steel). The metering device consists of twelve spikes and is made of a metallic plate to apply the Urea uniformly. The applicator has a furrow opener and closer options. The effective field capacity was 0.13 ha/h with a speed of 1.22 km/h and field efficiency of 98%. Due to the continuous falling mechanism, there is no missing option but found the over-falling urea for both hoppers was found 5.35%. The average depth of urea placement was 6.38 cm. The machine was user-friendly to push, and the mean pushing force was 63.89 N. The weight of the applicator was 9 kg. So, it is natural to carry from one field to another field. The applicator is also convenient to handle, operate and manage.