Dinâmica de vibração da interação máquina e planta na colheita do café

Abstract

The coffee industry stands out worldwide due to its socioeconomic importance, acting directly or indirectly in the most diverse sectors. With this, new technologies and several harvester models have emerged. These harvesters have regulations that can influence the efficiency of harvesting, the selectivity of fruits and the preservation of the crop. In this way, the understanding of the behavior of harvester components and their dynamic relationship with coffee is essential for mechanical harvesting management and for new the product development. This work aimed to evaluate the dynamic interaction between harvester and coffee branches in a mechanical coffee harvesting, with two passes of the harvester, in order to know the effects on the harvesting, defoliation and selectivity of the fruits. The experiments were conducted at a property located in Nepomuceno, Southern Minas Gerais. The methodology employs concepts of signal conditioning and processing for achieving the results, which were divided into qualitative and quantitative ones. Through the instrumentation of the coffee plants and the use of signal processing techniques, it was possible to achieve the displacements (amplitudes peak to peak) of the coffee branch over the effects of vibration frequency and brake force of the vibrating cylinder adjusted in the harvester. The results showed that the higher vibration frequencies lead to lower vibration amplitudes of the coffee branch and in these conditions has occurred the higher efficiencies of harvesting. The vibration amplitudes of the branch in the horizontal direction have shown to be correlated with the defoliation, for the highest vibration frequencies, and with the selectivity of fruits, for the lowest vibration frequencies. From the results, on can understand the efficiency of harvesting, defoliation and fruit selectivity, contributing to the development of new products, harvest management and serving as a base for new studies.