17-12-2012, 06:51 PM
DESIGN AND FABRICATE THE PROTOTYPE OF A MOTORIZED CUTTER FOR
HARVESTING PALM FRUIT
DESIGN AND FABRICATE.pdf (Size: 1.28 MB / Downloads: 170)
ABSTRACT
Nowadays, agriculture especially palm fruit have some problem such as how to
increase the productivity and profit, how to reduce the cost and how to solve the
problem come from foreign workers. A new motorized cutter specifically designed for
palm trees was designed and developed. It comprises three criterions, easy to fabricate,
low cost and light weight. By using design and fabricate the mechanical cutter, the entire
problem can solved easily. There are some procedures to solve this problem such as
design using several concepts, sketching and modeling the design, fabricate the
prototype using suitable material and test the functioning of this machine. So the
objectives are to design and fabricate the prototype of motorized cutter for a harvesting
palm fruit.
INTRODUCTION
Background
Argriculture can define as the science, art, and business of cultivating soil,
producing crops, and raising livestock or farming. Nowadays, agriculture are the new
field that can give many advantages and benefits to our life especially to our economy,
politics and social. There are many parts in agriculture such as coconut fruit, pineaplle,
palm fruit, livestock and farming. For the new focus is on palm fruit which is Malaysia
want to produce own bio-chemical that can use for fuel and any application for the
consumer. Now, production in petroleum are decrease. Beside that, from BBC News on
September 2008, Malaysian price for 1 litre petrol is RM 2.30 [5]. That why Malaysia
focus on this palm fruit because many researchers from this country and outside believe
this fruit is usefull which is can use as a fuel and can take place from petroleum.
In agriculture, there are two major input especially palm fruit which are
machinery and labour (MPOB Information Series June 2007) [3]. The main objective
from this input is maximizing the profit, productivity must increase and the cost must
reduce. From that, the conclusion is machinery can maximizing the profit, increase
productivity and reduce cost. One of the important activities in palm fruit cultivation is
harvesting. Harvesting is the act of removing a crop from where it was growing and
moving it to a more secure location for processing, consumption or storage. The major
factor to determine the time of harvest is the maturity of the crop. The other factor is
weather, availability of harvest equipment, picker, packing and storage facilities also
transport which is important consideration [7].
Problem Statement
In Rancangan Malaysia Ke-9 (RM9) where agriculture becomes the new focus
which can give many advantages and benefits especially to our economy, politics and
social. Palm fruit is one of the new targets in agriculture where still not much
researchers and manufactures participate in this field. From that there are some problems
arise such as how to maximizing the profit, how to increase productivity and how to
reduce the cost. One of the important activities in palm fruit is harvesting. This
harvesting operation requires 60% of total labor where some of the workers are foreign
Labour. The problems with foreign labor are increase the social problem in our society
and increase the money draining out to other country. So the ideas to reduce the
dependent on workers in this harvesting, this project comes to solve all this problems
where the new invention for machinery in harvesting which able to reduce the workers.
By using the tools like machinery, the dependent on the foreign worker can be reduce,
productivity can be increase, the cost can be reduce and the profit can be increase. From
that, the main objective for this project is to design and fabricate the prototype of a
motorized cutter to harvest palm fruit for commercial used can achieve.
Significant of Study
This study is to design and fabricate machinery which can reduce dependent to
workers especially to foreign worker which give many effect to our country such as
social problem and much of money draining out to other country. To design and
fabricate this machine, there are several criterion are selected such as easy to fabricate,
low cost in long term, and can harvest high and low palm fruit.
Harvesting
In agriculture, harvesting is the process of gathering mature crops from the
fields. Reaping is the harvesting of grain crops. The harvest marks the end of the
growing season, or the growing cycle for a particular crop. Harvesting in general usage
includes an immediate post-harvest handling, all of the actions taken immediately after
removing the crop—cooling, sorting, cleaning, packing—up to the point of further onfarm
processing, or shipping to the wholesale or consumer market.
Previous Method of Harvesting
The previous method to harvesting, the criteria of design and the recommended
design are the issues frequently mentioned in the literature (D.A. Adetan, L.O. Adekoya
and K. A. Oladejo Department of Mechanical Engineering) [7].