Computer Simulation for Haulage Performance of Power Tiller
The presence of a large number of marginal and small land holdings in India has rendered the power tiller to be the most suitable farm equipment for field operations, in view of its compact size, profitability and versatility, but the transport work which is also required to carry the farm produce is yet to be proved. Keeping these in mind, user friendly software was developed for predicting the haulage performance of power tiller to meet requirements in educational and research organizations. The developed software requires input parameters such as power tiller, trolley and operating conditions. The developed software was validated by conducting experiments with a 6.7 kW power tiller using a suitable trolley on tarmacadam road at various payloads and road slopes. The draft, slip, fuel consumption and speed were measured and other haulage performance parameters were calculated based on measured values to validate the developed software. The results simulated by software indicate lower draft and slip in the range of 1-23 and 2-9% with respect to the experimental data, however, higher transport productivity was in the range of 3-12%.
Benchmark of an intelligent fuzzy calculator for admissible estimation of drawbar pull supplied by mechanical front wheel drive tractor
Abstract This paper proposes a calculator for estimation of drawbar pull supplied by mechanical front wheel drive tractor based on nominal input variable of tractor driving mode in two-wheel drive (2WD) and four-wheel drive (4WD), and numeral input variables of tractor weight (53.04–78.45 kN) and slip of driving wheels (1.4–15.1%) utilizing intelligent fuzzy systems. The systems were developed by means of various input membership functions, output membership functions, defuzzification methods, and training cycles. The prominent developed system for estimation of the drawbar pull yielded a user-friendly intelligent fuzzy calculator with admissible accuracy (coefficient of determination = 0.993). Data obtained from the calculator revealed increasing nonlinear trend of the drawbar pull in range of 12.9–57.5 kN as concurrent augment of slip of the wheels and tractor weight, for 2WD mode. In case of the 4WD mode, it nonlinearly raised from 12.8 to 77.7 kN. Therefore, effect of the slip and weight on the drawbar pull was found synergetic. Moreover, the drawbar pull ranges elucidated that the drawbar pull proliferated as the 4WD mode was employed rather than the 2WD mode. Generally, benchmark of the prominent developed intelligent fuzzy system, not only provide simple calculator with the widest applicability for different tractor models, but also produces added values in enrichment of realization level in domain of tractor drawbar pull concepts.
Demonstrating Tractor Performance Trends using Lotus Templates
Tractor performance results obtained from Lotus templates were demonstrated. Comparison of bias-ply versus radial-ply tires, dual versus single tires, and the influence of travel speed, tire size, ballast distribution, soil condition, two-wheel-drive (2WD) and four-wheeldrive/mechanical-front-wheel-drive (4WD/MFWD) tractors was shown. An alternative calculation mode can be used to determine the required weight to obtain a desired performance. This mode was used with an optimizing ballast scheme to predict the optimum wheel slip and maximum tractor efficiency for each comparison. The tractor performance templates have been used as an educational tool to demonstrate these comparative features to both undergraduate classes and farm clientele.