The spring-tine harrow is gaining popularity for mechanical weeding. However, its weeding performance and mechanism have not been well understood. A spring-tine harrow was first tested in a controlled indoor soil bin at four different travel speeds (4, 6, 8, and 10 km h−1) with three different spring-loading settings (low, medium, and high). Then the harrow was tested in a wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) field at the same spring-loading settings at three different weeding timings (early, middle, and late) in 2019 and 2020. Soil cutting forces (draft and vertical), soil displacements (forward and lateral), soil working depth, weed control efficacy, weed density, and crop damage were measured. The results showed that the spring-loading setting had a more dominant effect on working depth and soil cutting forces than the speed. The soil displacements were more dependent on the speed compared with the spring-loading setting. Treatment effects on weeding performance indicators in the field were similar across years. Adjusting the spring-loading setting from low to high improved the weeding efficacy from 44.9% to 73.9% in 2019 and from 51.6% to 78.1% in 2020. Consequently, the final weed density was minimized at the high loading setting, with the reduction in 2020 being significant. The middle weeding timing caused the least crop damage, while reducing the final weed density by approximately one-third compared with the control (without mechanical weeding), which was the most desired outcome among the three timings tested.

中文翻译：

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受时间和操作参数影响的弹齿耙除草性能

弹簧齿耙在机械除草方面越来越受欢迎。然而，其除草性能和机制尚未得到很好的了解。弹簧齿耙首先在受控的室内土仓中以四种不同的行驶速度（4、6、8 和 10 km h-1) 具有三种不同的弹簧加载设置（低、中和高）。然后在小麦中测试了耙子（小麦L.) 2019 年和 2020 年三个不同除草时间（早期、中期和晚期）在相同弹簧加载设置下的田间。土壤切割力（吃水和垂直）、土壤位移（向前和横向）、土壤工作深度、测量杂草控制效果、杂草密度和作物损害。结果表明，与速度相比，弹簧加载设置对工​​作深度和土壤切削力的影响更大。与弹簧加载设置相比，土壤位移更依赖于速度。多年以来，处理对田间除草性能指标的影响相似。将弹簧负荷设置从低调整到高，2019 年除草效率从 44.9% 提高到 73.9%，2020 年从 51.6% 提高到 78.1%。因此，在高负荷设置下，最终杂草密度最小化，2020 年的减少幅度很大。中间除草时间对作物的损害最小，同时与对照（没有机械除草）相比，最终杂草密度降低了约三分之一，这是三个测试时间中最理想的结果。