Combine Travel Route Division for Accurate Automatic Reaping
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Solution Overview
Problem
In agricultural fields with cereal culms planted in multiple rows, workers face difficulties in visually determining the correct number of rows and their alignment, leading to inefficient automatic reaping travel routes, which can result in decreased threshing accuracy and increased waste due to improper division of the work region.
Innovation Solution
A combine equipped with a travel route creation unit that calculates a recommended number of divisions based on the work region's size, reaping information, and turn information, dividing the region into optimal sections to create efficient travel routes for automatic reaping, and an automatic drive control unit to execute these routes.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If a worker visually checks the work region and arbitrarily decides the number and positions of divisions, then the travel route can be created, but it is difficult to correctly determine the number of rows and their length, leading to decreased work efficiency
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces the manual visual checking method with an image processing system that captures images of the agricultural field, detects row information automatically, and calculates the number of rows and their lengths using computational algorithms, thereby eliminating the imprecision of human visual estimation
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an image processing device as an intermediary between the work region and the travel route creation unit. This intermediary captures visual data, processes it to extract row information, and provides accurate measurements to the route creation system, enabling precise division determination
2Length of moving object
If a smaller number of divisions is set, then the divided region becomes longer in row aligning direction, but the distance of travel route without working between divisions becomes longer
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the parameter of division number from an arbitrary value to an optimized value calculated based on multiple factors including row information, combine reaping width, turn time, and work efficiency requirements. The travel route creation unit computes the optimal number of divisions that balances region length and non-working travel distance
Solution Approach 2:
The patent makes the division configuration dynamic by allowing the system to adjust the number and positions of divisions based on real-time calculations of row alignment, field dimensions, and operational constraints, rather than using fixed or arbitrary division schemes
3Ease of manufacture
If the length of divided region is not set as a multiple of reaping width, then the division can be created, but courses with smaller number of rows to be reaped are set, decreasing threshing accuracy and causing waste straw to be caught
Solution Approach 1:
The patent enforces a constraint parameter that the divided region length must be a multiple of the combine's reaping width. The system calculates division positions to ensure this mathematical relationship holds, thereby guaranteeing that each course contains an optimal number of rows for effective threshing operation
Solution Approach 2:
The system incorporates feedback mechanisms where the travel route creation unit continuously verifies whether the calculated division lengths satisfy the multiple-of-reaping-width condition, and adjusts division positions accordingly to maintain threshing accuracy and prevent waste straw contamination
Data Source
AI summary
A combine includes a control device configured to function as a travel route creation unit which creates a travel route in an operation region of a field, and an automatic operation control unit which controls automatic traveling and automatic reaping along the travel route. The travel route creation unit, when creating the travel route in which automatic reaping traveling is performed by reciprocal movement over a plurality of courses along a row direction in the operation region having a plurality of rows of the agricultural field, performs: calculates a recommended number of divisions of the operation region based on the size of the operation region, reaping information per one course of a reaping unit, and turning information according to a state between courses; divides the operation region into multiple divided regions based on the recommended number of divisions; and creates the travel route over the multiple divided regions.