Design, Simulation, And Performance Evaluation of the "Teff" Cleaning and Separating Machine
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Date
2023-02
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Teff is a staple food in Ethiopia. It is the most important crop in terms of cultivation area and production value. While the majority of farmers still thresh their crops by hand, significant efforts have recently been made to change the traditional method of threshing and cleaning teff. However, due to flaws in these machines, such as the capacity of the thresher and the cleaning mechanism used to clean the teff grain, the farmer's needs are not met. The major goal of the thesis is to design, and simulate a 3.5 Quintal/hr. teff thresher with a cleaning mechanism in Autodesk Inventor Pro 2016 is used to model the product and ANSYS 2018 was used to calculate the static analysis of the threshing drum, display the modal response, and perform computational simulation of the cyclone separator. For the simulation of cleaning the teff grain with the chaff and other pollutants in the cyclone, three alternative particle sizes and speeds were used, and the separation effectiveness was assessed. The results of the demonstration show that the average grain to straw ratio, threshing drum rotational speed (rpm), and feed rate (kg/hr.) were 0.4875, 1044.5, and 820.6, respectively. These data were used to design the newly improved teff thresher. Three cases with constant inlet velocity were chosen for the cleaning mechanism. Because the particle diameter of teff grain varies with moisture content, three different moisture contents were used: 6%, 12%, and 30%, with particle sizes of 0.7114, 0.7735, and 0.871 mm, respectively. The properties of the grains in the cyclone have been investigated and presented. The cleaning efficiency of the cyclone increases as particle size increases, and as particle size decreases, the cleaning mechanism also decreases.The design and analysis of a teff thresher with a cyclone separator and a capacity of 3.5 quintal/hr were explained in this research paper. As a result, the thresher's capacity was increased. Furthermore, a new type of cleaning mechanism is introduced, which has a good cleaning performance and is a nearly non-maintainable machine component due to the lack of moving part. Adoption of teff and mechanization technologies will benefit small households by lowering grain losses and increasing income due to improved handling methods and market prices. The research will allow for the generation of a wide range of benefits in terms of research knowledge and capacity. Policymakers, local manufacturers, researchers, and agricultural extension workers all benefit from the research knowledge.
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Threshing, cleaning efficiency, teff, threshing drum, computational simulation