It was back in summer 2014 that we first reported on Kverneland’s intention to re-enter the self-propelled sprayer market, and now that’s come to fruition with the firm’s spraying gear mated with a Mazzotti skid unit. The iXdrive has some interesting technology on board
It’s been a while since the Kverneland Group (more specifically its subsidiaries Rau and Vicon) has had its own in-house engineered self-propelled sprayer. Enter iXdrive, the result of a marriage of an Italian Mazzotti self-propelled chassis with a top-spec, rear-mounted Vicon spray pack built at the company’s Nieuw Vennep plant in the Netherlands.
Outwardly the machine has a definite air of familiarity about it. That’s probably because it uses the Vista cab, borrowed from Claas combines and foragers. The cab sits well out front of a chassis built to distribute weight as evenly as possible. By positioning the engine and hydrostatic driveline directly over the front axle, the tank smack in the middle and the boom out over the tail, the balance of loading front-to-rear alters by just 1%, from 50:50 loaded to 51:49 empty. Even loading also makes for a smoother ride and a more stable boom-carrying platform. That’s been aided by some careful thought put into chassis design, according to Vicon.
Up front there’s a solid axle suspended on a pair of hydraulic rams, damped with a series of gas-filled accumulators to account for varying loads. At the back there’s a triangular trailing-arm arrangement with a pivoting ball-joint at its leading point. This allows the rear axle to oscillate independently, again cushioned by rams and nitrogen dampers. The axles themselves are solid telescopic beams with hydraulic extend and retract, either manually — a job that requires a jack, some spanners and half an hour’s workshop time — or at the flick of a switch via the optional in-cab control. Track widths can be varied from 1.80m to 2.25m or 2.25m to 2.95m, depending on the axle ordered.
