Using the Toro Geolink System to Increase Spraying Efficiency

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Toro Geolink SystemChemical spraying is key to proper turf maintenance, but it is also very expensive.  It’s easy to be wasteful and use too much of a chemical spray even with the best and most efficient equipment.  Fortunately, Toro has found a revolutionary new way to use GPS technology to make spraying turf in parks and golf courses less expensive and more efficient.  The new technology is known as the Toro GeoLink system, and it can be used with any Toro Multi Pro 5800 system.

How GeoLink Works

The Toro GeoLink system uses multiple GPS satellites and a Real Time Kinematic or RTK signal correction antenna to pinpoint your exact location as you are spraying turf.  It knows exactly where you’ve sprayed and where you have to spray, and it uses individual spray nozzle controls to be accurate down to the centimeter.  The result is the kind of consistent and accurate application that has never been possible with conventional turf-spraying technology.

The Toro GeoLink system also comes equipped with a weatherproof touchscreen that shows your location on your turf and allows you to create and implement different application jobs.  This touchscreen is very easy to use and requires you to only map out your course once before it can be saved for future applications. These courses can be as simple and complex as you need them to be as well.

For example, you can create an application that only targets a golf course’s greens even if there are 18 of them spread out over a large area.  The system also creates accurate reports that can be downloaded for analysis and for making any future jobs that much easier.  All you need to do is plug a flash drive into the touchscreen monitor to download all the data you need on any project.

The GeoLink Advantage

The reason why the GeoLink system is so efficient is that it was designed with turf application in mind as opposed to farming or agriculture.  Spraying a treatment chemical on a golf green is different from spraying farmland, and Toro has prepared for this by allowing GeoLink to compensate for multiple inclusion zones and other factors that only apply to turf spraying.  It know exactly how much of a chemical to mix for a specific job, and it makes sure that the operator uses only that amount.

GeoLink and GPS-based turf spraying systems definitely have plenty of benefits, but they are still in their infancy.  As with all new technology, you should make sure that a GeoLink system is worth the investment.  If you have a smaller area to cover and you’ve done just fine with your current turf spraying system, you may not need GeoLink yet.  On the other hand, it could be exactly what you need if you have to cover a lot of ground.  Preliminary trials have shown that the GeoLink system can cut the costs of chemical sprays by as much as 14 percent.  GeoLink was clearly worth the investment for those who have tested it out, and it could represent the future of turf spraying technology.

To learn more about the Toro GeoLink system, contact a Toro distributor such as Kenney Machinery Corporation.