| In the design of a viable and appropriate cassava tuber harvester, the lifting coefficient of cassava tuber was determined to be a function of lifting force, lifting time, speed of lifting, weight of the tuber and soil surrounding the tuber. This paper described the design, construction and operation of an instrumented rig which allows the simulation of cassava tuber harvesting in the field. The rig consisted of the gantry, chain block, chains, hook/fisher, variable speed electric motor, 5 kN load cell and DI-1000U data logger. The developed rig was tested in a matured cassava field located at the experimental farm of the National Centre for Agricultural Mechanization, Ilorin, Nigeria in 2012. The rig effectively uprooted cassava tuber in the field in... |
