Abstract
As a by-product of sugarcane industry, sugarcane green tops has not been effectively collected and utilized in the mechanized harvesting of sugarcane. It has caused significant economic losses. In this study, a tractor mounted sugarcane top chopper was designed. A series of field tests were carried out to explore the effect of the cutting speed and cutting drum gap on cane top recovery weight and machine chopping efficiency. In the field experiment, a 2 factor 3 level test was conducted to examine the significance of tested factors’ effects on evaluation indicators. According to the 2 factor 3 level test, the effect of cutting speed on recovery weight was recorded better than that of cutting the drum gap. Cutting speed had a significant impact on chopping efficiency, but in case of cutting drum gap had no significant impact on it. The optimal parameters combination for good working performance of the machine was obtained with cutting speed of 150 rpm and cutting drum gap of 20 mm. This paper analyzed the relationship between the chopping performance and the two critical factors that provided a theoretical basis for the design and development of sugarcane top chopper.
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Acknowledgements
We acknowledge that the research was supported by the Major Program of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 32071916), the Major State Research Development Program of China (2016YFD0701200) and China Agricultural University, Institute for New Rural Development Guangxi Fusui Professor Workstation Grant (201805510710115). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the view of China Agricultural University. The authors would also like to express our gratefulness to Mr. Jun Wang and Mr. Pingang Wu for test arrangement.
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Hu, J., Ma, S., Wang, F. et al. Design and Development of Sugarcane Top Chopper and its Field Performance. Sugar Tech 23, 1192–1198 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12355-021-00990-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12355-021-00990-8