Design, Development and Evaluation of Paddy Transplanter for Wash Root Nursery
Loading...
Date
2022
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana
Abstract
A tractor operated paddy transplanter for wash root nursery was designed, developed, and
evaluated. The paddy transplanter is PTO driven and hitched to a tractor three-point linkage.
This machine can be operated by 35 hp or above tractor. The machine consists of main frame,
gear boxes, chain-sprockets, major & sub shafts, seedling trays and nine transplanting
mechanisms. The planting mechanism to delivers seedling from seedling tray and place it into
ground by plunger which was operated via cam. A four-bar extended arm mechanism was
selected, because the working end oscillates under the designed path by converting the rotary
motion which was initially supplied to the smallest link. The power from tractor PTO is
transmitted to planting mechanism through a series of connecting shafts, chain-sprockets and
gear boxes mounted on main frame. Forward speed (1.5, 2.2 and 3.3 km/h), mechanism speed
(200 & 254 RPM) and age of nursery (25, 35 and 45 days) was selected as independent
parameters whereas the missing index, numbers of plants per hill, damage percentage and
plant to plant spacing were observed for evaluating the developed transplanter under
laboratory condition. As the speed index increases, the plant to plant spacing and missing
index increase from 123.1 mm to 240.4 mm and 31.11 percent to 64.44 percent, respectively.
The number of plants per hill and the damage percentage both decreased as the nursery grew
older, from 4.47 to 2.20 plants and 6.67% to 2.22%, respectively. Forward speed of 1.5 km/h
and mechanism speed of 254 RPM was selected for field evaluation. The age of nursey (25,
35 and 45) was selected as independent parameter for field evaluation, whereas missing
index, multiple index, damage percentage, plant to plant spacing, planting efficiency, field
capacity, fuel consumption, cost of operation and yield were selected as dependent parameters
and compared to manual transplanting (control). Significant difference was observed in
missing index, multiple index, damage percentage, and field capacity at different ages of
nursery, however plant to plant spacing, planting efficiency and yield had no significant
difference at different ages of nursery. The observed missing index, damage percentage, plant
to plant spacing were found higher and multiple index, planting efficiency and yield were
found lower as compared to control. The best operating parameter found as forward speed of
1.5 km/h and mechanism speed of 254 RPM for 35 days of nursery. At these operation
parameters, missing index was 31.18%, multiple index and damage percentage 4.40%, plant
to plant spacing 142.5 mm, planting efficiency 60.75%, field capacity 0.29 ha/h, fuel
consumption 4.13 l/h, cost of operation 9512.60 Rs/ha and yield 4.75 t/ha.
Description
Keywords
Citation
Singh, Neeraj Kumar (2022). Design, Development and Evaluation of Paddy Transplanter for Wash Root Nursery (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation). Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana, Punjab, India.