A simulation of optimum power requirements of selected grain threshers

Abstract

A power requirement model was simulated at three factor interaction of process variables in order to select a combination of optimum crop and machine variables (crop moisture content, feed rate, cylinder speed) that will yield minimum grain losses for millet and sorghum threshers. The viability of the model was demonstrated in selecting minimum grain loss for various combinations of process variables and power requirement. Result obtained from the simulations revealed that a minimum grain loss of 0.09% was obtained for millet thresher and 0.35% for the sorghum thresher at 9% grain moisture content, 5m/s cylinder speed, and feed rate of 0.03 kg/s. The power requirements obtained at these levels were 2.5kW and 4.6kW for millet and sorghum threshers respectively. This compares well with actual measurements using the same values of the parameters with a minimum grain loss of 0.10% for millet and 0.46% for sorghum threshers, at 2.45kW and 4.5kW power requirements for millet and sorghum threshers respectively