Effect of the air duct medication on the spray drift emitted by an air-assisted sprayer

For improving the spray performance and making it meet the requirements of working in an orchard, a modification that a cone-shaped air duct and a columnar air duct were installed to replace the original air outlet of the air duct of a conventional air-assisted sprayer was made. The simulation experiments show that the cone-shaped air duct can raise the horizontal speed of airflow, shape the spray pattern and reduce droplet energy loss, while the columnar air duct can make the gradient distribution of airflow speed at the air outlet, and the airflow with higher outer speed and lower inner speed can hold in the movement track of droplets, which can reduce spray drift and make a droplet deposition rate increase by 30.6%.