Results of Laboratory Studies of the Automated Sorting System for Root and Onion Crops

Abstract

The roller and sieve machines most commonly used in Russia for the post-harvest processing of root and tuber crops and onions have a number of disadvantages, the main one being a decrease in the quality of sorting due to the contamination of working bodies, which increases the quantity of losses during sorting and storage. To obtain high-quality competitive production, it is necessary to combine a number of technological operations during the sorting process, such as dividing the material into classes and fractions by quality and size, as well as identifying and removing damaged products. In order to improve the quality of sorting of root tubers and onions by size, it is necessary to ensure the development of an automatic control system for operating and technological parameters, the use of which will eliminate manual sorting on bulkhead tables in post-harvest processing. To fulfill these conditions, the developed automatic control system must have the ability to identify the material on the sorting surface, taking into account external damage and ensuring the automatic removal of impurities. In this study, the highest sorting accuracy of tubers (of more than 91%) was achieved with a forward speed of 1.2 m/s for the conveyor of the sorting table, with damage to 2.2% of the tubers, which meets the agrotechnical requirements for post-harvest processing. This feature distinguishes the developed device from similar ones.