Mechanism modeling and experimental analysis of seed throwing with rice pneumatic seed metering device with adjustable seeding rate
Introduction
Rice is the main food crop in China. The effect of rice planting will directly affect the yield of rice. At present, the degree of rice mechanized planting in China is relatively low (Zhang et al., 2018). According to statistics, the probability of rice mechanized planting in China is only 44.45%. Mechanical transplanting is still the main planting method in mechanized planting (Chan and Nor, 1993). Compared with mechanical transplanting, the mechanization of rice direct seeding technology is to directly sow rice seeds in the field (Farooq et al., 2011). It eliminates the process of raising rice seedlings, and reduces the input of prophase cost (Pandey and Velasco, 2004). It is one of the development directions of rice mechanized planting. Pneumatic seed metering device is a kind of seed metering device which combines air flow with machinery. Compared with traditional mechanical seed metering device, pneumatic seed metering device has the characteristics of low seed injury rate and high seeding precision.
In order to ensure that the pneumatic seed metering device can evenly and stably seed in the field, Scholars have done a lot of in-depth researches on pneumatic seed metering device. Singh carried out studies on pneumatic seed metering device for different crops, established the relationship equation between pressure and crop characteristics, optimized the parameters of sucking holes. He carried out an experiment on cotton, and obtained the best working parameters of the seed metering device (Singh et al., 2005). Xue studied the influence of rotational speeds of pneumatic seed metering device on seeding effect. Field tests were carried out on soybean and maize, and the relationship between rotational speeds of seed metering device and seeding effect was obtained (Xue et al., 2017). Zhang designed a rice pneumatic seed metering device, studied the process of seed sucking, seed carrying and seed throwing, analyzed factors affecting the seeding effect, optimized the general structure of seed metering device, and achieved high seeding precision (Zhang et al., 2015). Ismet studied the seeding hill space of pneumatic seeder. The accuracy of seeding hill space was improved by using seed throwing diversion device, and the theoretical model of seed throwing trajectory was established under seed throwing diversion device. The distribution position of sucking holes and the angle of seed throwing diversion device were optimized by theoretical model. The validation tests were carried out with cotton and maize, and good results were achieved (Ismet et al., 2012). Sefa studied the effect of different ditching depths on the performance of seeding, and obtained the optimum ditching structure and the optimum ditching depth. However, this study only considered ditch depth, and did not analyze the influence of other factors on the performance of seeding (Sefa et al., 2013). Yazgi studied the performance of seeding of pneumatic seed metering device. Tests were carried out with maize and cotton seeds. The performance of seeding in hill and seeding precision were analyzed under different rotational speeds and different sucking holes. The optimum sucking holes of seeding plate were obtained (Yazgi and Degirmencioglu, 2014, Yazgi et al., 2010). In order to improve the seeding efficiency of potato pneumatic seed metering device, Lu studied the mechanism of zero-speed seed throwing combined with positive pressure airflow. The mathematic model of zero-speed seed throwing was established, and the influencing factors were evaluated. The verification tests were carried out and the sowing effect was improved (Lü et al., 2016).
High-speed camera was used to record the high-speed motion process which could not be recognized by the naked eye. It has been widely used in engineering technology. Karayel studied the relationship between the hill space and seed throwing. High-speed photography was used to observe and analyze the seeds throwing process. Tests were carried out with soybean, and the best seed throwing method was obtained, which improved the stability of seeding hill space (Karayel, 2009, Karayel et al., 2006, Karayel et al., 2004). Zhao studied the seed throwing process of cylinder pneumatic seed metering device. High-speed photography was used to record the whole seed throwing process. The effects of seed throwing position, rotational speeds of the seed metering device and positive pressure on the seed throwing trajectory were analyzed. The structural parameters of the cylinder pneumatic seed metering device were optimized through experiments (Zhao et al., 2010). Zahra designed a real-time monitoring instrument for seed throwing trajectory by using high-speed photography technology. The instrument could monitor the seeding precision and the seeding hill space. The dynamic model of seed throwing process was established. However, the instrument was only used for single grain sowing, which could not identify the phenomenon of seed overlap (Zahra and Saman, 2018). Yu used high-speed photography technology to study the throwing trajectory of the rape pneumatic seed metering device. The effects of different positive pressure and rotational speeds of seed metering device on seed throwing trajectory were analyzed. The relationship between the positive pressure and the seeding hill space was obtained, and the optimum positive pressure was optimized, which provided the basis for the seed throwing mechanism (Yu et al., 2014). Xing studied the seed throwing process of rice pneumatic metering device. Combining high-speed photography technology with grid board, the location of seed throwing trajectory was recorded. Influence factors of the seed throwing trajectory were analyzed, and the working parameters of seed metering device were optimized (Xing et al., 2015).
At present, researches on seed throwing of pneumatic seed metering device were mainly focused on single-seed seeder. Researches mainly considered the influence factors of hill space. Because rice seed metering device usually uses multiple rice seeds for sowing, it was necessary to study the performance of seed throwing in hill in rice sowing. At present, it is difficult for rice seeds to fall into a hill in the field. The poor performance of rice seeding in hill leads to the uneven distribution of rice seeds in the field, which will affect the growth of rice. Uneven rice planting will affect the ventilation and lighting of rice, which will easily cause diseases and insect pests, resulting in yield reduction. In this study, the location distribution of sucking holes was optimized according to asynchronous seed throwing method. The model of the seed throwing mechanism was established and validated by comparative experiments, which provided a reference for improving the performance of rice seeding in hill. In this paper, seeds falling to the ground and forming a hill is abbreviated as seed throwing in hill. The performance of seed throwing in hill is abbreviated as the performance of throwing in hill (Yang et al., 2014, Peng and Yang, 2003).
Section snippets
Principle of rice pneumatic seed metering device with adjustable seeding rate
As shown in Fig. 1, the rice pneumatic seed metering device with adjustable seeding rate is mainly composed of seed box (1), seed box connector (2), gas chamber shell of multiple flow-paths (3), seed chamber shell (4), seed cleaning device (5), flange (6), shaft (7), seed brush (8), sucking plate (9), seed tube (10), and seed unloading device (11).
When a seed metering device was working, seeds were getting into the seed sucking area of the seed chamber shell through seed box and seed box
Experimental material
In order to verify the above theoretical analysis, super hybrid rice wuyou 1179 was selected as the experimental material. Because there were a lot of blighted grain in rice seeds, the quality of blighted grain was lighter than normal rice seeds, which would have a serious impact on the test results. Therefore, the rice seeds were soaked in clear water before the experiments, the blighted grains and impurities were removed. Then they were dried by airing, and the average moisture content was
Test results and analysis of seed throwing trajectory
High-speed photography was shown in Fig. 12. From the high-speed photography, it could be seen that the falling process of rice seeds produced a time lag, and the rice seeds on the first group of sucking holes fell first. The center of the sucking plate was taken as the coordinate origin. The areas of rice seed falling trajectory were counted, and the frontal seed falling trajectories were shown in Fig. 13, Fig. 14, Fig. 15, Fig. 16, Fig. 17.
From Fig. 13, Fig. 14, Fig. 15, Fig. 16, Fig. 17, it
Discussion
It could be seen that the seed throwing trajectory was the motion trajectory of the rice seed relative to the seed metering device. Seed throwing in hill was the distribution of seeds falling into the paddy, which needed to take into account the movement speed of the seeder. According to the above results, when the group number of sucking holes was small, the qualified rate of seed throwing in hill was high. The main reason was that the initial position of rice seed falling was relatively
Conclusion
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This study analyzed and modeled the seed throwing trajectory of the rice pneumatic seed metering device with adjustable seeding rate, and photographed and analyzed the seed throwing trajectory with high-speed photography technology. The theoretical seed throwing trajectory and the actual seed throwing trajectory were compared, and the factors affecting the seed throwing trajectory were studied. The frontal seed throwing trajectory errors of five groups of sucking holes were less than 10 mm,
CRediT authorship contribution statement
He Xing: Conceptualization, Software, Methodology, Validation, Formal analysis, Writing - original draft. Zaiman Wang: Project administration, Investigation. Xiwen Luo: Supervision, Writing - review & editing. Siyu He: Methodology, Formal analysis. Ying Zang: Project administration, Funding acquisition.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
The authors are thankful for funding from National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project No. 31871529), Supported by the earmarked fund for National key research program (Project No. 2017YFD07000700, 2017YFD07000704), and China Agriculture Research System (Project No. CARS-01-41). We would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their critical comments and suggestions for improving the manuscript.
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