How About Some Maintenance with that Pest Control Equipment?
Posted by Andrew Greess on Nov 9, 2019
When purchasing pest control equipment, landscape equipment or spray equipment, be sure to think about maintenance before you buy.
All equipment requires maintenance. Even the best quality equipment requires maintenance. Plan for it up front. Don't make the mistake of ignoring maintenance until you actually need to do it. Repairs are much more costly than preventative maintenance.
This post will share some key points about pest control sprayer maintenance because that is what I know about, but the key points probably apply to most types of equipment.
We have seen numerous examples of landscape spray equipment where not planning for maintenance had a serious cost. There are some photos in this post that show situations where maintenance was more difficult, time consuming or expensive than it needed to be.
Here are some questions to consider about maintenance before buying equipment:
- What maintenance is required & when?
- What parts are likely to fail?
- Are the parts requiring maintenance easily accessible?
- Where do I get maintenance parts?
- Who will do maintenance?
- Where will maintenance be performed?
- How long will maintenance take and what is the impact on my operation?
Remember - Preventative Maintenance (PM) is cheaper than waiting for equipment failure and making repairs. Another benefit of is that you get to pick when you do it. Repairs happen when equipment fails, which is usually when you are busy. PM occurs at your convenience: slow times, vacations, weekends, etc.
Here are some photos of actual power sprayer equipment to demonstrate these points.
|
|
Customer brought sprayer in for pump maintenance. There was no shut off valve in front of the filter. We could not service the pump until the customer figured out a way to empty the tank. |
|
|
Pumps are so close together, it is impossible to remove the input/output fittings without first removing the pump. This makes extra work, which wastes time and money. |
|
|
Hose reel swivels require regular maintenance. This pest control spray rig was very poorly designed. The only way to service this hose reel swivel is to remove the sprayer from the vehicle, unbolt the reel to get access to the swivel. A 5 minute, 1 man job beccomes a 2 man, multi-hour job. |
|
|
Changing Honda engine oil will help your engine run great
for many years.
On a pest control sprayer with a low motor mount like this, there is no good way to change the Honda engine oil. There are 3 choices: 1. Drain oil all over truck 2. Unbolt sprayer, remove from truck to drain oil 3. Don't change oil. #3 is what usually happens in this situation. |
|
|
QES100 Skid mount sprayer. Raised motor mount with oil change hose makes oil changes easy, extending engine life. |
|
|
Before you buy, think about cleaning your truck. You spent a lot of money on your truck, your equipment, your logo, you uniforms, etc. You need to present a great image. A filthy truck does not help.
Question: How do you clean up the chemical that spills around this equipment? Answer: You don't. This sprayer sits flat on the truck bed. There is no good way to clean this eqiupment. |
|
|
Here's how we do it. Raise the frame 2 inches so you can clean under the skid. Simple. |
Please shop Qspray.com for all your pest control equipment, landscape equipment, power spray equipment.