ERGONOMIC ASSESSMENT OF MANUALLY OPERATED ROTARY MAIZE SHELLER.
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Date
2019-10-11
Authors
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Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola, Maharashtra.
Abstract
Maize or corn (Zea mays L.) is a plant belonging to the family of grasses (Poaceae) which is most important cereal crop after wheat and rice produced throughout the country. From the carry out survey of existing practices of maize shelling, observed that the procedure of shelling maize is very difficult, and maize shelling efficiency is very low, these problems are solved by hand operated rotary maize sheller. Its work output depends on the machine as well as on the operator. So, for overcoming these problems develop user-friendly and safe mechanism of pedal operated for existing maize sheller with reduced drudgery and minimum seed damage. Therefore, the ergonomic study of maize shelling was felt very necessary. The present research work was carried out with the main objective so as to increase the human-machine system efficiency and also improve the operator’s health and able to operated with great efficiency, accuracy and safety. So, in view to focuses on energy considerations which arise from the physiological and psychophysical responses studied considering pedal length, seat height, backrest height with three different levels on modified pedal mechanism.
The interpretation of the results of the study leads to the following major conclusions. Physiological and psychophysical responses were affected by pedal mechanism and minimum values were observed with pedal length 180 mm, sitting height 710 mm and backrest height 400 mm, respectively. The lowest working heart rate, increase in heart rate and oxygen consumption rate were observed to be 101.67 beats min -1, 27.5 beats min -1 and 0.34 lit min-1, respectively whereas body-part discomfort score, overall discomfort score and percentage of maximum oxygen consumption rate were found to be 7, 2.88 and 19.62 %, respectively. However cardiac cost of operation and energy expenditure rate was found to be 9.5 beats kg-1 and 8.81kJ min-1, respectively and highest output capacity i.e. 220 kg h-1 was obtained at same combination. So, working heart rate in existing maize sheller in “very heavy” and in modified maize sheller categorized in “moderately heavy”. It may be concluded that the pedal mechanism can be successfully used as an interface between the human worker and a hand rotary type machine for getting more output from the machine with less effort and fatigue as compare to existing maize sheller.
Description
The present study deals with the development of user-friendly and safe mechanism of pedal operated for existing maize sheller for reducing drudgery and minimum seed damage. Therefore, the ergonomic study of maize shelling was felt very necessary. The present research work was carried out with the main objective so as to increase the human-machine system efficiency and also improve the operator’s health and able to operated with great efficiency, accuracy and safety. So, in view to focuses on energy considerations which arise from the physiological and psychophysical responses studied considering pedal length, seat height, backrest height with three different levels on modified pedal mechanism.
Keywords
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Citation
Gedam, Kanchan Vasantrao. (2019). Ergonomic assessment of manually operated rotary maize sheller. Department of farm power and machinery (Agricultural Engineering), Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola. Ph.D. 2019. Print. xxii, 287p. (Unpublished).