Cleaning your knapsack sprayer

You will need:

• your pesticide label
• your knapsack sprayer and its handbook
• clean water
• a mixing tray or a square meter of plastic sheet
• a spill kit
• detergent
• a paper towel and plastic bag
• a small container
• record sheets and your

Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). Unless the pesticide label directs otherwise, wear the same PPE for cleaning your knapsack sprayer as you do for applying the pesticide.

You will also need a safe area for cleaning. Refer to your label for any advice on selecting an area that is away from animals, children and surface water such as streams and ponds, and is not near any drinking water sources and other sensitive areas.

If you are using a plastic sheet, lay it on soil and scoop the soil around its edges to form small ridges. This should work in a similar fashion to a mixing tray.

It is important to wear PPE because the sprayer is likely to be contaminated on the outside

as well as the inside and these deposits can easily contaminate you and your work place.

Add about a litre of clean water to the sprayer tank.

If the label requires you to use detergent, add it to the water now.

Replace the lid, shake and then carefully invert the sprayer.

Remove the nozzle and its filter

and soak both in a container of water.

Remove the lid and tank basket filter. Direct the end of the lance into the tank and pump the lever to circulate the water/cleaning solution. Without the nozzle in place – you can pump very easily and will get a very rapid flow through the system which washes out the pump and all the hoses.

Check that the lid, filter basket, nozzle and its filter are clean before now refitting.

Where the detergent used will not damage plants, spray the rinsing water onto an unsprayed part of the treatment area.

Using only water, rinse the tank twice more in the same way. The inside of the sprayer should be clean.

Next wash the outside of the sprayer over your plastic sheet or tray and dispose of the rinsing water safely.