Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Design of Innovative Pulse Thresher: Bksahaandskmandal
Design of Innovative Pulse Thresher: Bksahaandskmandal
In manual pulse thresher, input rotary motion is converted into reciprocating motion of beaters. Due to indefinite swing
angle of beaters usual four bar linkage cannot be used for this purpose. In this proposed investigation, a novel mechanism
has been designed to overcome the problem of indefinite swing angle as is necessary for meaningful operation of manual
pulse thresher. Here, Grash of mechanism has been modified to generate the desired kinematics. At first, particular four bar
linkage satisfying Grash of’s criteria has been designed considering definite swing angle of beaters, followed by a suitably
designed slot has been incorporated into the coupler design to obtain indefinite swing angle. This modified linkage
mechanism has been tested successfully to generate variable (may vary even on every cycle) swinging of beaters while
taking rotary motion as input.
degree. From the geometry shown in the Figure 2(a), Slotted-link mechanism
the length of the thresher can be obtained from the The above said mechanism along with a slot,
trigonometric relationship between O1M, BM and α positioned suitably in one of the linkages, is used in
expressed in Eq. (1). this application. Basic objective of the pulse thresher
O1 M α
must be considered for converting the mechanism, as
= cot ... (1)
designed above, to a useful one. The energy stored in
BM 2
the beaters along with the eccentric masses is
From the relationship, we get length of the thresher utilized for threshing of pulses. Now, the beater’s
platform as 1400 mm. Figure 4(a) shows the variation downward stroke may end up anywhere depending
of thresher length with maximum angle of elevation upon the pulse accumulation. In order to avoid
of beaters. system complexity beaters must be allowed to fall
Determination of linkages length freely in this downward stroke. During the free
From the Figure 2(b), the following trigonometric falling of beaters power from the driving shaft,
relationship is obtained here it is the crank shaft, does not get transmitted
BB ' α directly to the beater shaft at the moment of
= 2 sin ... (2)
actual contact of beaters with the pulses. So,
BO2 2
eccentric masses are mounted on the beater shaft to
Crank length increase the beating force. Now, the main objective
Assuming the follower length, BO2, as 100 mm, of the mechanism design is to generate the upward
BB´ is obtained from Eq. (2). BB´ is calculated as 136 stroke of the beaters. The conventional cam
mm. Now, BB´ is exactly twice the crank length, mechanism can serve this purpose but only to
O1A. So, crank length comes out as 68 mm. increase the equipment overall cost. A slotted link
Coupler length
mechanism reduces the cost by reducing the number
The trigonometric relation for calculation of coupler of components as well as eliminating costly
length, AB, may be obtained as Eq. (3). So, from Eq. (3) manufacturing process.
the length of the coupler link comes out as 958 mm. Design of slotted-link mechanism
Starting point of designing slotted-link
AB = BM 2 + MO12 − O1 A ... (3)
mechanism is the Grashof mechanism which has
Length of fixed link been designed above. Characteristics of the slot also
From the geometry shown in Figure 2(b) the depend on the minimum and maximum swing angle.
trigonometric relation for the fixed link, O1O2, is Maximum value of swing angle of the follower, as
expressed as Eq. (4). The fixed link length is obtained obtained from the basic mechanism designed above,
as 961 mm. is α max = 86° . Minimum swing angle depends on the
2
... (4) type of application. Two important activities of
O1O2 = MO1 + ( BM − BO2 ) 2
threshing operation are uploading and downloading
Grashof’s criteria of pulses to and from the threshing platform. During
In the above calculation, the length of the linkages both of these activities, beaters should remain idle at
can be arranged as below. l min = 68 , l max = 961 , their highest inclined position from horizontal plane.
With this consideration minimum swing angle is
l ' = 100 , l '' = 958 Now, lmin + l max = 1029 and
taken as α min = 0° . The slot should be so provided
' ''
l + l = 1058 . Therefore, it is obvious from the above that when the beaters get struck or remain idle then
calculation that and (l min + l max ) < (l ' + l " ) Hence, the the pin connecting the follower and the coupler
linkages satisfy the Grashof’s criteria. With this moves in this slot allowing the coupler to move
Grashof mechanism, we can generate swinging without transferring any motion to the follower.
motion of beater through angle, α, varying from 00 to From the Figure 2(b) it is evident that the length of
860, assuming α=00 when beater touches the threshing the slot must be equal to BB´ so that crank shaft can
platform. But the accumulation of pulses on the rotate continuously even when the beaters remain
threshing platform changes the starting value of α idle at the highest elevation. Width of the slot
dynamically. So, modification in the mechanism is depends on the diameter of the pin connecting
necessary to cope up with this difficulty. coupler and the follower.
SAHA & MANDAL: DESIGN OF INNOVATIVE PULSE THRESHER 53
Fig. 3 —a) Variation of beater/follower position with crank angle Fig. 4 — a) Variation of Thresher length with maximum elevation
and b) Variation of torque coming from beater set with crank angle of beaters angle b) Prototype of Manual Pulse of Thresher
54 J SCI IND RES VOL 77 JANUARY 2018
continuously. The pin connecting the coupler and method. In four bar linkage, stroke of reciprocation is
follower is in the middle of the slot which was fixed. If angular stroke of reciprocation depends on
designed. This happens because no further movement some uncertainties then cam is incorporated in the
of the beaters is possible. In fact, during the upward mechanism to bring flexibility into the system. Design
movement of beaters, this pin touches the top end of of cam surfaces is, in general, complex in nature.
the slot. Now, during the downward movement of the Also, the incorporation of cam mechanism increases
Beaters, a little after the moment the beaters come the number of components. The novel linkage
into contact with the pulses the pin starts moving with mechanism, described here, is an easy to incorporate
respect to the top end of the slot. Exactly at this point, mechanism to replace cam and which will,
the mechanism without the slot would get locked and necessarily, reduce the system complexity as well as
no further operation would be possible. This relative the manufacturing cost.
movement of the pin in the prototype allows the
mechanism to run continuously. This machine is used Acknowledgements
for efficient threshing of matured crop of different This work was supported by the Council of
pulses, irrespective of different shape and size of Scientific & Industrial Research, New Delhi under
plants or grains. It can be applied for green gram, CSIR-NIF Fellowship scheme.
black gram, arhar, horse gram, lentil etc., with
minimum power consumption and labour input. The References
crop residue can be used as animal feed. About 50% 1 Nene Y L, Indian Pulses Through the Millennia, Asian Agri-
harvesting cost is reduced and 10% yield is increased History, 10(3) (2006) 179–202.
2 Karthikeyan C, Veeraragavathatham D, Karpagam D
over the traditional threshing methods as grain loss in & Firdouse A, Traditional tools in agricultural practices,
crop residue is reduced to almost nil and the rate of Ind J Trad Knowledge, 8(2) (2009) 212-217.
operation is 2 to 3 times faster with a threshing 3 FICCI, Agricultural Machinery Sector in India (2014).
capacity of 400 kg/hr of the dry crops. 4 Gopalbhai Suratia, Manual pulse Thresher, Innovation Ref
No: 41GJ24A0134 (2011).
5 5 Gatti G & Mundo D, On the direct control of follower
Conclusions vibrations in cam–follower mechanisms, J Mechanism and
Conversion of rotating motion to reciprocating Machine Theory, 45 (2010) 23–35.
motion using four bar linkage is a well known 6 FAO-GIEWS, Food Outlook, June (2013).