Design of sawing anti-blocking mechanism for no-tillage planter and its cutting mechanism

Based on blocking issues of no-tillage planter for dry-land farming in two-crop-a-year region in North of China and shortcomings of anti-blocking mechanism developed, such as higher rotation speed (above 1500 r/min) and bigger power consumption (width power consumption per unit up to 16～41.74 kW/m, including traction power), a new sawing anti-blocking mechanism was developed and its cutting mechanism was investigated in this paper. Meanwhile stress distribution of the saw-tooth blade calculated by the ANSYS finity element software showed that the saw-tooth blade would be feasible to cut corn straws. Experimental results in the soil bin showed that: 1)The sawing anti-blocking mechanism with two cutting modes of sustaining and no-sustaining cut could realize an integrated function of cutting and directly throwing by reverse rotation, namely, it could throw straws directly to the rear of the opener by former angle of saw-tooth and thrower; 2)The cutting rate of straws would increase along with the rising of straw moisture and rotation speed, and higher moisture of straws would be of benefit to improving cutting quality; 3)The cutting rate of straws would decrease along with the rising of velocity of vehicle while interval of the moved and fixed blade was determined. And the sawing anti-blocking mechanism had higher cutting quality and lower power consumption without leaky cutting and tearing out with small interval of the moved and fixed blade. Compared with other driving anti-blocking mechanisms, theoretical analysis and experimental results showed that the sawing anti-blocking mechanism had fine cut capability and lower rotation speed (650 r/min) and lower power consumption (power consumption per unit width up to 2.95 kW/m) as well as stronger suitability to different stubbles mulch. Additionally, a new way was found out to improve anti-blocking performance of no-tillage planter.