Development of a Real-Time Tillage Depth Measurement System for Agricultural Tractors: Application to the Effect Analysis of Tillage Depth on Draft Force during Plow Tillage

Abstract

The objectives of this study were to develop a real-time tillage depth measurement system for agricultural tractor performance analysis and then to validate these configured systems through soil non-penetration tests and field experiment during plow tillage. The real-time tillage depth measurement system was developed by using a sensor fusion method, consisting of a linear potentiometer, inclinometer, and optical distance sensor to measure the vertical penetration depth of the attached implement. In addition, a draft force measurement system was developed using six-component load cells, and an accuracy of 98.9% was verified through a static load test. As a result of the soil non-penetration tests, it was confirmed that sensor fusion type A, consisting of a linear potentiometer and inclinometer, was 6.34-11.76% more accurate than sensor fusion type B, consisting of an optical distance sensor and inclinometer. Therefore, sensor fusion type A was used during field testing as it was found to be more suitable for use in severe working environments. To verify the accuracy of the real-time tillage depth measurement system, a linear regression analysis was performed between the measured draft and the predicted values calculated using the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) standards-based equation. Experimental data such as traveling speed and draft force showed that it was significantly affected by tillage depth, and the coefficient of determination value at M3-Low was 0.847, which is relatively higher than M3-High. In addition, the regression analysis of the integrated data showed an R-square value of 0.715, which is an improvement compared to the accuracy of the ASABE standard prediction formula. In conclusion, the effect of tillage depth on draft force of agricultural tractors during plow tillage was analyzed by the simultaneous operation of the proposed real-time tillage depth measurement system and draft force measurement system. In addition, system accuracy is higher than the predicted accuracy of ± 40% based on the ASABE standard equation, which is considered to be useful for various agricultural machinery research fields. In future studies, real-time tillage depth measurement systems can be used in tractor power train design and to ensure component reliability, in accordance with agricultural working conditions, by predicting draft force and axle loads depending on the tillage depth during tillage operations.

Study of Some Field Indicators for the Chisel Plow by Using Locally Developed Shares

“…Moreover in increasing depth that increases the necessary with drawal requirements to overcome these forces. These results are consistented with the results which were obtained (Al-suhaibani and Gali, 2010; Kim et al, 2020). Also, it was found that the severed share significant outperformed the conventional shares and the spearhead in obtaining the lowest draft force at a rate of (6.99) kN compared to the remnant of the treatments,That was due to the lack of confrontation of the surface of the severed share through penetration with the lowest resistance and therefore the lowest draft force, but the increase in the draft force of the spearhead share, is due to an increase in its confrontation with the soil further, as a result of the increase in the area of the share facing the soil when penetration with the deep of the share and thus the increase in the draft force, and these results are consistent with what was reached (Alrijabo and Kashmola, 2013) where they confirmed that the draft force increases with an increase in the width of the share.…”

“…Manuwa and Ademosun (2007) and Jebur and Alsayyah (2017) found in their study of the influence of soil moisture content on the draft force, that the draft force increases as the soil moisture content increases, especially in clay soils. Increasing the depth of tillage of the chisel plow can lead to an increase in the draft force clearly (Al-suhaibani and Gali, 2010;Kim et al, 2020) where they observed when the speed was fixity, the draft force increased by a clear increase when increasing the depth of tillage from (11 to 19) cm. Al-Talabani et al (2015) explained in a field study that the roughness of tillage appearance is directly proportional to the increase in the depth of tillage because the sub-surface soil has a higher density and hardness than surface soil.…”

Power Transmission Efficiency Analysis of 42 kW Power Agricultural Tractor According to Tillage Depth during Moldboard Plowing

“…In addition, in research related to agricultural machinery, it can be said that the draft force between the attachment plowing implement and the test soil directly affects the tractor load and power requirements according to the travel speed and slip ratio. In this field experiment, a commonly used six-component load cells system was used to measure the draft force [39,40]. The six-component load cells system consisted of six tensile compression-type universal type load cells (UU-T2, DACELL, Cheongju, Korea) to measure the 3-axis forces (horizontal, vertical, and lateral) that occurred during tillage operation.…”

“…In order to analyze the effect of tillage depth, which is one of the most influential factors on mechanical load of agricultural machinery such as draft force, wheel axle load, engine load, and slip ratio, several studies on the development of real-time tillage depth measurement systems have been conducted [40,42]. In this field experiment, shortcomings (universality, durability) of the tillage depth measurement system developed in previous studies were improved and used for field experiment.…”

Effects of planting distance and depth on PTO load spectrum of a small riding-type transplanter

“…Because transplanter perform the task of penetrate the transplant hopper into the soil, the physical condition of the soil is one of the factors affecting the workload. Thus, the physical environment of the soil as a reference of the measured transplanter PTO load was obtained as shown in Figure 3b [19] . The soil moisture and electric conductivity were measured using a soil sensor (WT100B, RF sensor, Seoul, Korea).…”