
doi: 10.2139/ssrn.1571023
This study was divided into three phases. In the first phase the feasibility of available water hyacinth chopper cum crusher was tested for the chopping of sorghum and modified. In the second phase the different cylindrical cutters were selected and fabricated. During the last phase, their performance was evaluated for per cent volume reduction and power requirement for chopping of Sorghum. On the basis of preliminary trials of water hyacinth chopper cum crusher for chopping of Sorghum drawings of a modified Sorghum chopper was prepared in AutoCAD. The system was fabricated at CTAE, MPUAT Udaipur, workshop and a testing plan was developed for its performance evaluation. The performance of the developed system was evaluated on the basis of its ability to per cent volume reduction and cutting power required for chopping of sorghum crop. Four levels of independent variables namely feed rate (1250, 1500, 1750 and 2000 kg/h), cutter speed (13.4, 14.4, 15.4 and 16.4 m/s), and three cutters (cylindrical cutter, spiral cutter and forage cutter) were selected and tested. It was found that with the increase in feed rate and speeds of cutter the per cent volume reduction increased. The results shows that the modified machine can reduce the per cent volume of sorghum up to 76 per cent at the feed rate of 2000 kg/h and cutter speed of 16.4 m/s when forage cutter is in use whereas; cylindrical and spiral cutter gives 68 and 61 per cent at the same cutter speed and feed rate. The minimum cutting power requirement was found when spiral cutter is operated at minimum speed of 13.4 m/s and feed rate 1250 kg/h where as the maximum power is consumed by the cylindrical cutter with all levels of feed rates and cutter speeds. At last it can be concluded that the modified chopper gives best results with forage cutter at the feed rate of 2000 kg/h and cutter speed of 16.4 m/s.
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