Irrigation Workshop

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Irrigation Workshop

• Todd Cavins
• Allen Hammer
• Brian Whipker
• Gordon Elsbury

NC STATE UNIVERSITY
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Greenhouse Automation For The Small Grower
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Automation is a Tool

• A tool is both contrived and used for extending
  the force of an intelligent agent to something
  that is operated upon.

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Automation is driving the future of the
greenhouse industry
And the size of the greenhouse does not matter
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Greenhouse size does affect what you automate
however
Every greenhouse can automate something for a
profit
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How do you increase profit?

• increase price
• lower costs
• increase efficiency

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Automation just doesnt work unless there is a
major area of one crop at one time
It is simply not true that
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why automate?

• make work easier
• small window of opportunity
• holiday markets, too much work in a short period
  of time
• improved work quality
• less quality workforce
• lower labor costs
• replace unavailable labor
• labor is your major production cost

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Is finding labor a problem?
orIs it just easier to deal with automation than
employees?
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Fingers do not do it better
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Automation
Look at greenhouse tasks

• - repetitive
• - tedious
• - time-consuming

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Study tasks time and motion studies
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What are those time consuming hand labor jobs?
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What are your major costs?

• Where does it make sense to reduce production
  costs?
• automation is probably your most important cost
  savings

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Take A Systems Approach to Automation

• automating a job
• automating a process
• Automation should be cost effective
• It should be a short term investment - one that
  has a payoff in a very few years

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Study your entire greenhouse operation
labor saving devices often produce better quality
and more uniformity automation often times work
location of materials and controls is very
important for efficiency and reducing worker
fatigue
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Automation has a learning curve

• automation often requires a different approach
• automation allows worker to better manage the
  plants
• automation often increases skill levels

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do not use the single minded approach of only
considering efficiency or reduced costs
Automation can have added benefits
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improved working conditions
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Do not simply automate your present way of doing
things
think new
You do not automate your hose - you automate
watering
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Automation - first things first

• Watering
• Materials handling
• Benches
• Flat and pot fillers
• Seeders
• Transplanters

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watering Ebb and Flood Trough Drip Spaghetti
Tubes Boom Mat Stationary Overhead Sprinklers
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Automation

• it does not have to be complex or expensive

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Plastic pipe and valves
Has made it very easy to automate greenhouse
watering

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design the system with both clear and fertilizer
water
fertilizer injectors are very important even in
the smallest of greenhouses

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Simple and Conservative
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• Watering
• Watering is both a science and an art

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You can not do it better by a hand
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Perched water table
The science and the art of watering
Free water

• When to water?
• How to water?
• You can apply too little water
• You can not apply too much water

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Hand watering
is not better is not cheaper Is not easier

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Automation - first things first

• Watering is the very first thing to automate