Near Intersection of I-35 & I-90 Southern Mn. | Both plans should be workable. Each approach has its advantages/disadvantages.
One of your thoughts involves mounting the section valves at a distance from the controller so you are wondering about the AMP draw of the section valves. This is a valid concern. Here's how most of these work: A pair of wires known as High Current are necessary to each valve. This is the pair that provides the "power" to do the "work" of opening the ball valve by running the motor clockwise and closing the ball valve by running the motor counterclockwise. The action of running the motor is handled by an internal relay in the ball valve housing. This relay is controlled by a trigger wire from the controller. Since it takes very little current to move the points in the relay, the electrical load is very small. A 16 gauge wire is adequate for that.
This means that the distance between the controller and the section valve is not critical and 16 gauge wire would be very adequate. However the High Current wires that provide the power to actually run the motors (they often all run at the same time) would be a concern. Having a pair of large wires directly off the battery is usually best. In some cases such as my Ag Leader cables there are two sets of High Current pairs. This spreads out the electrical load without having to use a single pair of very large wires.
In the past I had an 8120 Deere tractor with Sidequest tanks and a 3 point sprayer. I use Ag Leader components. I had the hydraulically driven centrifugal pump mounted on the base of the right Sidequest tank. I had a plate made of flat steel that was attached to the right Sidequest tank up higher. The plate contained a Raven Flow meter, Raven motorized control valve and 3 section valves as well as the Ag Leader Liquid Product Control module. I drilled a hole through the cab floor on the right side and fed through an Ag Leader CAN cable and a pair of High Current wires to provide power/ground for the Liquid Module and the section valves which were the ball type that need constant power. This worked fine
I also had/have an 8310R Deere tractor with Sidequest tanks that are used with spray while planting. This is laid out differently. Again a hydraulically driven centrifugal pump is mounted on the SideQuest frame. A tee is installed in the outlet side of the pump so some flow can be fed back to the tanks for agitation. The main line is 1" and leads out the back of the tractor to a quick coupler. A mating quick coupler and 1" line on the planter feeds the flow to the rear of my 1770NT planter. A plate containing a flow meter, motorized control valve and Liquid Product Control valve is mounted on the side of the CCS ladder/platform assembly. The output from this plate splits into a tee with one branch leading out the left wing and the other out the right wing. At each wing, each branch is teed again to feed a pair of section valves. This means I have the spray split up into four sections. A set of Wilger flow columns is attached to each section valve. The Wilgers distribute the flow among the spray tips for each section and give a visual indication of the flow rate.
High current power/ground and the section control valve triggers need to reach all the valves. This means a set of four wires goes from the rear center of the planter out each wing. A pair of large wires provide High Current power/ground for the valves. The other two wires are smaller and provide the triggers out from the control module.
An Ag Leader implement cable and extensions are run from the hitch of the planter along one of the brace arms and eventually reaches the spray plate. The connection point at the hitch contains two pairs of High Current Pairs connected to the tractor battery and a CAN branch.
At the rear of the planter, a CAN tee is used to split up the CAN connection to all the modules and a terminator. The High Current power is split up to fed each module as needed and the section valves. I use two implement switches wired in parallel. They inform both the Liquid Module and my Clutch Control Module when the planter is down in the planting position.
For the planter, the Liquid components and Module could have been mounted on the SideQuest tanks such as I did with the other tractor and 3 point sprayer. Since I needed to run an implement cable back on the planter for the other modules, I decided to have the Liquid Components located on the planter also. This means I only need one feed line from the tractor to the planter.
If the Side Quest tanks and Liquid Controls were going to be used with that tractor and some other implement, mounting them on the tractor to be reused would probably have been better.
Edited by tedbear 3/27/2026 10:00
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planter liquid setup help needed
