Teejet Technologies products have been part of farming applications since the first crop protection products came onto the market in the 1940's, dating back the earliest use of electronics in agriculture. This experience in the fields of spraying, fertilizing, and seeding allows Teejet Technologies to provide quality products and suitable technical solutions for farmers, such as guidance and steering systems, field computers and devices for application control and monitoring. In this sense, EGNOS plays a significant role as the basic GNSS correction system for all European farmers that employ precision farming devices from Teejet Technologies.
José María Alonso de Robador Lorente, Precision Farming Customer Support Engineer of Teejet Technologies in Europe, confirms that “all guidance and rate controller systems we offer over Europe include EGNOS and start using it as soon as are plugged to a GNSS antenna.” Jose María also highlights as a main added-value that “EGNOS is a quite accurate free-of-charge solution that provides high performance to our customers”. In terms of application, “EGNOS can ensure high-quality spraying and spreading jobs, avoiding gaps and overlaps when using ABSC (Automatic Boom Section Control).”
EGNOS can be employed anyway for other tractor labours, being mainly recommended for those types of crops that do not require centimetre level accuracy, i.e. extensive crops in dry areas, such as dryland cereals, legumes and sunflowers. In general, “if the crop allows a pass-to-pass error up to 20 cm, there is no reason to spend a huge amount of money on more precise correction services”, José María explains. Additionally, Teejet Technologies promotes the use of EGNOS as a “non-expensive autosteering solution” among their customers, emphasizing that “the availability of EGNOS corrections makes Teejet autosteering products more competitive in the market.”
EGNOS performance and reliability are highly appreciated by Teejet Technologies, because “our customers always give a positive feedback in relation to EGNOS corrections. It is common to receive calls asking for support on EGNOS, which means that the farmers are actually using it.” In this sense, Jose María also remarks the usefulness of the EGNOS User Support Website, as “we consult it mainly to know the current availability and forecast of the EGNOS SIS (signal in space). When we get support requests related to EGNOS, we always check its current configuration online, to ensure that the device’s set-up is the appropriate one.”
Mario Bonzano is one of the multiple European farmers that benefits from EGNOS capabilities by means of Teejet Technologies products. Mario grows mainly rice, along with other rotation crops, in his fields at Agiliano Vercellese in the north of Italy. Mario uses EGNOS, integrated in his guidance system and rate application controller, in all instruments from Teejet Technologies, since 2017. Mario describes the process to configure EGNOS in his equipment as “simple and easy. Just install the system in the tractor, plug it and select the option “EGNOS MODE – AUTOMATIC in the settings menu.” In this way, the GNSS receiver connects automatically to the EGNOS satellites.
Mario takes advantage of the high availability of EGNOS signal over Europe by satellite, stating that “I always run both my autosteering system and the ABSC of my sprayer in EGNOS mode.” Among the multiple benefits that EGNOS offers to farmers, Mario highlights that he obtains “a much better precision control of my spraying jobs. I never overlap because the autosteering system works very accurately. Also every boom section switches on/off exactly where it should.” For these reasons, Mario promotes GNSS in general and EGNOS in particular, recommending to all European farmers “to install as much satellite controlled systems as possible. It improves the work, reduces costs and makes your life easier.”