A STUDY ON SOME ENGINEERING PARAMETERS OF CUTTING AND CHOPPING MACHINE FOR AGRICULTURAL WASTES

Abstract

This study aimed to evaluate the performance of chopping machine during cutting some farm residues (rice straw and faba bean stalks) to minimize their size and volume. The results indicated that the highest machine productivity for rice straw and faba bean stalks of 0.144 and 0.120 Mg/h and the highest machine efficiency of 99.5 and 98.0% and the lowest energy requirements of 12.50 and 15.0 kW.h/Mg and the lowest operating cost of 21.22 and 25.46 LE./Mg for rice straw and faba bean stalks respectively, were obtained at speed of knives 1800 rpm (37.68 m/s), number of knives 32, serrated knife edge and spacing between bars of concave 20 mm. On the other side, the highest percent of cutting length < 2 cm of 53.40 and 43.30% for rice straw and faba bean stalks respectively, were obtained at speed of knives 1800 rpm (37.68 m/s), number of knives 32, serrated knife edge and spacing between bars of concave 10 mm.