RESULTS OF LABORATORY STUDIES OF THE SEPARATING SYSTEM WITH THERMAL ENERGY OF CLEANING THE POTATO HARVESTING MACHINE

Abstract

Harvesting potatoes in conditions of high soil moisture imposes restrictions on the implementation of the technological process associated with the impossibility of cleaning marketable products from mechanical impurities as a result of clogging the working surface of cleaning devices of various designs with wet soil. To reduce the time of cleaning while maintaining the quality of work, a separating system has been developed that provides for the possibility of using the heat of exhaust gases. The purpose of the study is to substantiate the technological parameters of the separating system using the heat of the exhaust gases of a potato harvester in conditions of high soil moisture. As an object of research, the separating system of a potato harvester, represented by a bar elevator with installed deflectors for blowing the working surface with exhaust gases from a power plant, whose operation under laboratory conditions is represented by a heat gun, was adopted. A laboratory setup and a methodology for conducting research on a separating system have been developed to determine the quality indicators of harvesting and justify technological parameters that affect the quality of cleaning potato tubers - the distance between the separating surface and the deflector, as well as the forward speed of the rod elevator. It has been established that the completeness of separation of potato tubers during harvesting in conditions of high soil moisture by constant blowing with a heat gun of the working surface of the rod elevator at the optimal values of the factors under consideration (the distance between the rod elevator and the deflector SD=127.8 mm, the translational speed of the rod elevator vD=1, 67 m/s) reaches 96.5%. The results of statistical processing of experimental data indicate the adequacy of the mathematical model of the dependence of the completeness of cleaning potato tubers on the studied technological parameters of the separating system