Development and test of a spring-finger roller-type hot pepper picking header
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
In order to improve picking efficiency, performance and reduce harvesting costs, this study developed a spring-finger roller type hot pepper picking header. The picking header was mainly composed of a roller, spring-fingers, a steel frame, an upper cover plate, and transmission parts. According to the mechanical characteristics of the hot pepper, the picking structure model of hot pepper was developed based on SolidWorks. The movement law of the picking spring-finger was analyzed based on the working principle to select appropriate motion parameters of main factors. A prototype of hot pepper picking header was developed based on these selected parameters, and field experiments were carried out to study main factors affecting the harvesting effect. The rotation speed of the roller and the travel speed of picking machine were monitored by setting sensors. The test results were analyzed and optimized based on Central Composite Design (CCD) by using Design Expert. The orthogonal test results showed that: when roller rotation speed was 215.00 r⋅min−1, and travel speed was 3.59 km⋅h−1, the hot pepper picking header had the best harvest effect. The picking rate was 98.47%, and the breakage rate was 3.87%. The field experiment proved that the spring-finger roller type hot pepper picking header had a good picking effect.
How to Cite
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.