Eficiência energética de uma picadora de forragens em função do estado das facas e da utilização de motor diesel e elétrico

Abstract

This work was developed with the objective of determining the energy use and the quality of the chopped material of a stationary forage chopper, powered by a diesel engine and electric motor, in function of the sharpness of the blades, the cut size and the feed rate of the machine. For that, a torque transducer was installed between the chopper and the motor and the rotation was measured with the aid of a tachometer. The experimental arrangement was a completely randomized design in a factorial outline, with 5 repetitions. The assays showed that the use of a dull blade presented higher average energy demand and specific consumption values and lower average production capacity values, besides presenting a cut quality inferior to that made with a new blade, thus demonstrating the need of the sharpness of the blades to obtain better machine performance. The highest feed rate, which was with 9 stalks, in spite of having presented higher energy demand, did not present higher specific consumption and also presented higher production capacity. The power source that presented higher production capacity was the electric motor. The work was conducted within the Engineering Department of the Federal University of Lavras (UFLA), in Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brazil, during the period of November, 2009 to January, 2010.