https://doi.org/10.4081/jae.2022.1388

Development and performance evaluation of an oil palm harvesting robot for the elimination of ergonomic risks associated with oil palm harvesting

Vol. 53 No. 3 (2022)
Submitted: 22 February 2022
Accepted: 15 June 2022
Published: 9 September 2022
Oil palm, mechanisation, harvester, ergonomic, fresh fruit bunch.
Abstract Views: 1099
PDF: 589
HTML: 245
Publisher's note
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Authors

Ayodeji Nathaniel Oyedeji
oyedejiayodeji@yahoo.com
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria.
Umar Ali Umar
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria.
Laminu Shettima Kuburi
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria.
Albright Abu Edet
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria.
Yau Mukhtar
Equipment Maintenance and Development Centre (EMDC), Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Nigeria.

This study was aimed at developing and evaluating the performance of an oil palm fresh fruit bunch harvesting robot that will eliminate the possible risks associated with oil palm harvesting. The result of this study showed that the average height of oil palm trees in the study area was 5.531 m, which shows the unsuitability of the existing traditional methods in the harvesting process. This study also used a geared DC motor to develop an oil palm harvester, solving the stability issue encountered by previous researchers during the harvesting process without necessarily reducing the climbing speed by a wide margin. In addition, the use of geared DC motor help in the production of high torque for the climbing process, and due to this high torque, instability during the harvesting process was reduced.

Dimensions

Altmetric

PlumX Metrics

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Citations

Crossref
Scopus
Google Scholar
Europe PMC
Akande F., Oriola K., Oniya O., Bolaji G. 2013. Level of oil palm production mechanization in selected local government areas of Oyo and Osun states, Nigeria. Innov. Syst. Des. Engine. 4:36-40.
Bankole A.S., Ojo S.O., Olutumise A.I., Garba I.D., Abdulqadir M.I. 2018. Efficiency evaluation of small holders palm oil production in Edo State, Nigeria. Asian J. Agric. Extens. Econ. Soc. 1-9. DOI: https://doi.org/10.9734/AJAEES/2018/40850
Bronkhorst E., Cavallo E., van Dorth tot Medler M., Klinghammer S., Smit H.H., Gijsenbergh A., van der Laan C. 2017. Current practices and innovations in smallholder palm oil finance in Indonesia and Malaysia: long-term financing solutions to promote sustainable supply chains. CIFOR Occasional Paper No. 177. Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Bogor, Indonesia.
Chinchkar D., Gajghate S., Panchal R., Shetenawar R., Mulik, P. 2017. Design of Rocker Bogie mechanism. Int. Adv. Res. J. Sci. Engine. Technol. 4:46-50. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17148/IARJSET/NCDMETE.2017.13
Cotta A., Devidas N.T., Ekoskar V.K. 2016. Wireless communication using HC-05 Bluetooth module interfaced with Arduino. Int. J. Sci. Engine. Technol. Res. 5:4.
Feldpausch T.R., Banin L., Phillips O.L., Baker T.R., Lewis S.L., Quesada C.A., Affum-Baffoe K. 2011. Height-diameter allometry of tropical forest trees. Biogeosci. 8:1081-106. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-8-1081-2011
Gold I.L., Ikuenobe C.E., Asemota O., Okiy D.A. 2012. Palm and palm kernel oil production and processing in Nigeria. pp. 275-298 in Palm oil, AOCS Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-9818936-9-3.50013-7
Jelani A.R., Ahmad D., Hitam A., Yahya A., Jamak J. 1998. Force and energy requirements for cutting oil palm frond. J. Oil Palm Res. 10:10-24.
Juman M.A., Wong Y.W., Rajkumar R.K., Goh L.J. 2016. A novel tree trunk detection method for oil-palm plantation navigation. Comput. Electron. Agric. 128:172-80. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2016.09.002
Keramat J., Jafari A., Rafiee S., Mohtsebi S. 2007. A survey on some physical properties of the Date Palm tree. J. Agric. Technol. 3:317-22.
Khurmi R., Gupta J. 2006. Theory of machines. Eurasia Publishing House (PVT) Ltd., New Delhi, India.
Kuwamura H. 2011. Coefficient of friction between wood and steel under heavy contact. J. Str. Cons. Eng. 76:1469-78. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3130/aijs.76.1469
Lam T.L., Xu Y. 2012. Tree climbing robot: design, kinematics and motion planning (Vol. 78). Springer, Berlin, Germany. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-28311-6
Maluin F.N., Hussein M.Z., Idris A.S. 2020. An overview of the oil palm industry: challenges and some emerging opportunities for nanotechnology development. Agron. J. 10:356. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy10030356
Myzabella N., Fritschi L., Merdith N., El-Zaemey S., Chih H., Reid A. 2019. Occupational health and safety in the palm oil industry: a systematic review. Int. J. Occup. Environ. Med. 10:159. DOI: https://doi.org/10.15171/ijoem.2019.1576
Othman N., Jaffar M., Ahmad H., Hasnum M. (2018). Development and localization of a mobile robot. pp. 121-122 in Proceedings of Mechanical Engineering Research Day 2018. Centre for Advanced Research on Energy, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Teknik, Malaysia.
Oyedeji A.N., Umar U.A., Kuburi L.S. 2021. Investigation of the allometry of oil palm trees in Nigeria for mechanization of the farming process. ATBU J. Sci. Technol. Educ. 9:123-30.
Oyedeji A., Umar A., Kuburi L., Apeh I. 2020. Trend of harvesting of oil palm fruit; the mechanisms, and challenges. Int. J. Sci. Res. Engine. Develop. 3:1053-63.
Pengfei G., Liquiong T., Subhas M. 2018. A novel robotic tree climbing mechanism with anti-falling functionality for tree pruning. J. Mech. Robot. 10:1-8.
Prasad A., Varghese T., Varghese T.T., Skariah E.N. 2016. Wireless palm tree harvester. Int. J. Adv. Res. Ele. Ele. Ins. Eng. 5:122-6.
Praveenbabu R., Sneha S., Pavan Kumar S., Yuvaraj R., Sanjay M. 2017. Tree climbing robot. Int. J. Innov. Emer. Res. Eng. 86-90.
Roser M., Appel C., Ritchie H. 2020. Human height. Available from: https://ourworldindata.org/human-height Accessed: January 31, 2020.
Saeed O.M.B., Sankaran S., Shariff A.R.M., Shafri H.Z.M., Ehsani R., Alfatni M.S., Hazir M.H.M. 2012. Classification of oil palm fresh fruit bunches based on their maturity using portable four-band sensor system. Comput. Electron. Agr. 82:55-60. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2011.12.010
Tan K.P., Kanniah K.D., Cracknell A.P. 2014. On the upstream inputs into the MODIS primary productivity products using biometric data from oil palm plantations. Int. J. Remote Sens. 35:2215-46. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/01431161.2014.889865
Vijay V., Pimm S.L., Jenkins C.N., Smith S.J. 2016. The impacts of oil palm on recent deforestation and biodiversity loss. PLoS One. 11:e0159668. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0159668

How to Cite

Oyedeji, A. N., Ali Umar, U., Shettima Kuburi, L., Edet, A. A. and Mukhtar, Y. . (2022) “Development and performance evaluation of an oil palm harvesting robot for the elimination of ergonomic risks associated with oil palm harvesting”, Journal of Agricultural Engineering, 53(3). doi: 10.4081/jae.2022.1388.
Copyright (c) 2022 the Author(s) Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

PAGEPress has chosen to apply the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) to all manuscripts to be published.