Agricultural Baler Rotor Assembly with Variable Tine Spacing
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing rotor assemblies for agricultural balers struggle to evenly distribute crop material, leading to suboptimal bale shape and rate, especially when dealing with varying windrow widths.
Innovation Solution
A rotor assembly with a rotor shaft featuring varying angular spacings between tines along its length, with more aggressive spacing at the center and less aggressive at the ends, ensuring even crop distribution into the pre-compression chamber.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If the tines are arranged in a V-shape pattern on the rotor shaft, then the rotor can move crop material towards the pre-compression chamber, but the crop distribution becomes uneven especially for narrow-windrow collection
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by varying the angular spacing of tines along the rotor shaft length. The central portion has a first angular spacing between adjacent tines, while the end portions have a second angular spacing that is greater than the first. This creates different functional zones: the central portion with tighter spacing handles narrow-windrow collection effectively, while the end portions with wider spacing prevent excessive crop accumulation at the sides for wide-windrow collection. Each section of the rotor is optimized for its specific location's crop distribution needs.
2Ease of manufacture
If the angular spacing between tines is uniform along the rotor shaft, then the rotor structure is simple, but the crop distribution in the pre-compression chamber becomes uneven
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements local quality by dividing the rotor shaft into distinct zones with different angular spacings. The central portion maintains a smaller angular spacing to effectively gather and distribute crop from narrow windrows, while the end portions use a larger angular spacing to prevent crop accumulation at the sides. This zoned approach optimizes crop distribution uniformity across the pre-compression chamber while maintaining reasonable manufacturing complexity through systematic spacing variations.
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
AI summary
The present invention provides a rotor assembly for an agricultural baler. The rotor assembly has a rotor shaft having a central portion and first and second end portions either side of the central portion. The rotor assembly has a number of tine plates to be arranged axially along the rotor shaft, each of the tine plates having one or more tines. The tine plates are arranged such that there is an angular spacing between the tines of adjacent ones of the tine plates. A magnitude of the angular spacing is greater or smaller at the central portion than at the first and second end portions of the rotor shaft. This can help to ensure that collected crop is more evenly distributed when it is moved into a pre-compression chamber of the baler in the case of relatively narrow or wide windrows, in particular that the crop that fills the sides of the pre-compression chamber is optimal, which means that a desired bale shape and bale rate may be more readily achieved.