Experiments and Analysis of a Conveying Device for Soil Separation and Clod-Crushing for a Potato Harvester

Abstract. Bruising and damage losses are the most important key factors restricting the potato harvesting mechanization. The experimental work was conducted on an in-house conveying device for soil separation and clod-crushing testbed, which could be used to set a constant potato-soil proportion. In this work, a preliminary study was carried out to clarify the soil cushioning the potatoes travelling on separation sieve at different separation stages. Impact characteristics and movement processes were also studied. An impact recording device and high-speed camera technology were employed to obtain the instantaneous dynamics of the potato-soil mixture. The peak acceleration does not exceed 28.20 g when the potato-soil proportion increases from 18.07% to 38.55%; the peak acceleration reached 105.33 g when the potato-soil proportion was 100%. The number of impacts and peak impact acceleration are positively correlated with the vibration intensity of shaking rubber wheel under the condition of the same potato-soil proportion. It is noteworthy that the influence of the potato-soil proportion on the number of impacts and the peak impact acceleration was more obvious than that of the running speed of the separation sieve. This work provides a technical reference for the further investigation of bruising minimization and potato-soil separation technology. Keywords: Impact recording, Motion characteristics, Potato, Potato-soil proportion, Potato-soil separation.