Technical Field

The technical solution concerns the device for continuous cleaning of an agricultural machine surface which solves the problems associated with the cleaning of impurities such as plant residues and other coarse impurities from the surface of agricultural machines.

Background of the technical solution

At the present agricultural machines designed to mulch plants are equipped with knives that are attached the machine rotors. During mulching agricultural crops, there are many flying off plant residues and other impurities that stick on the surface of the machine designed to mulch agricultural crops. The rotor drive of the agricultural machine is provided, for example, by the tractor's power take-off shaft, but it can also be adapted differently. The rotary motion is transmitted to blades rotors using conical gears, the machines are equipped with friction clutches against overloading that allow the drive shafts to slip in the event of overloading the knife rotors, thereby the friction clutches are heated to the flame temperature from the plant residues adhering to the friction clutches space.

The main disadvantage of this design is the fact that during the work it is often necessary to stop and clean the surface of the agricultural machine from plant residues, especially the space around the friction clutches and the angular gearboxes to avoid the flare-up of plant residues and consequent damage of the agricultural machine.

At the present it is also known the device for continuous cleaning of the surface of an agricultural machine intended for mulching agricultural crops to be used during operation, which uses three fans located on the middle frame of the machine. The fans are positioned so that each one of them can clean one of the machine frames, i.e. two side frames and one central frame. The main disadvantage of this design is the fact that three fans have a high fuel consumption at work which increases the cost to run the farm machinery. Another disadvantage of this design is the large air dispersal of the fans even outside of the required space on the agricultural machine, which leads to wastage of the fan power outside of the required space of the agricultural machine and to the excess fuel consumption. The disadvantage is also a very inaccurate rectification of the airflow from the fans that hit the surface of the machine and thus turbulent flow happens which causes some impurities to remain on the surface of the machine where the bevel gears or other parts of the rotor drives of the agricultural machine are.

Summary of the technical solution

The above-mentioned drawbacks are eliminated up to a considerable extent by the device for continuous cleaning of the surface of the agricultural machine from plant residues and other impurities where the frame of the agricultural machine is connected to a base frame according to this technical solution, the essence of which is that on the frame of the agricultural machine there is a centrally located pneumatic device equipped with a fan with a protective grid at the top and equipped at the bottom with a dividing element for distribution of an airflow, where the fan drive is ensured by hydraulic motor via a hydraulic circuit provided with a regulating valve, where the rectifying flaps of the horizontal airflow and the rectifying flaps of the vertical airflow are attached to the base frame by means of the rotary screws and the positioning screws.

The centrally located pneumatic equipment attached to the frame of the agricultural machine contains at least one fan. The upper part of the pneumatic device for cleaning of the surface of the agricultural machine is equipped with a protective grid that prevents the penetration of coarse impurities into the pneumatic system. The protective grid has also safety function to prevent injury due to the insertion of a body part into the rotating parts of the machine or injury of people nearby the agricultural machine caused by flying off coarse impurities from the fan blades. The lower part of this device is adapted to attach the pneumatic device to the frame of the agricultural machine.

The device for cleaning of the surface of an agricultural machine from plant residues and other coarse impurities is equipped with rectifying flaps which serve to direct the airflow to the critical locations of the agricultural machine where large amounts of plant residues or other coarse impurities are deposited in the horizontal as well as in the vertical direction.

The main advantage of this design is the simplicity to adjust the rectifying device to accurately direct and target the airflow to critical places on the surface of the agricultural machine where plant residues and other impurities are deposited.

Another advantage of this design is the risk reduction of the fire occurrence. Thanks to the more precise direction of airflow, the plant residues or other impurities are removed from the parts of the agricultural machine that are heated during the operation, since agricultural machines are equipped with, for example, friction clutches which slip by the machine overloading and this heat them up. When friction clutches are heated up, there is an increased risk of fire from plant residues or other impurities that settle near to friction clutches and conical gears.

Another advantage of this design is seen in the positioning of the pneumatic device directly on the frame of the agricultural machine. This arrangement allows the airflow to be maintained to avoid the impact of the airflow on the surface of the agricultural machine and to avoid the creation of turbulent airflow.

Additional advantage of this design arrangement is seen in cost savings because there are no frequent stops of the agricultural machine for the reason of performing mechanical cleaning of the surface of the agricultural machine. The dividing element ensures the airflow division from at least one fan to desired directions. It is advantageous for proper operation that the dividing element is in the shape of the truncated pyramid or the truncated cone.

Description of drawings

The attached drawing serves for further clarification of the nature of the technical solution, the figure 1 illustrates the device itself without being attached to an agricultural machine; the figure 2 shows a cross-section of the device itself without attachment to an agricultural machine, the figure 3 represents an axonometric view of the device without attachment to an agricultural machine, and the Figure 4 shows the device positioning on the agricultural machine.

Examples of implemented technical solution

The device for continuous cleaning of the surface of an agricultural machine from the plant residues and other impurities, as depicted on Figures 1 , 2, 3 and 4, is created: the frame 1 of the agricultural machine is connected to the base frame 2, which is based on the fact that on the frame 1 of the agricultural machine there is a centrally located pneumatic device 3 equipped on top with at least one fan 4 with protective grid 5 and at the bottom equipped with the dividing element 7 for division of airflow where the fan drive 4 is ensured by hydraulic motor 3 via a hydraulic circuit 9 provided with a regulating valve 10, where the rectifying flaps 6 of the horizontal airflow and the rectifying flaps 8 of the vertical airflow are attached to the base frame 2 by means of the revolving hinges 12 and the positioning screws 11

The entire device for continuous cleaning of the surface of the agricultural machine is, as per figure 4, attached to the frame 1 of the agricultural machine by means of the fixing screws 14. The fan 4 is equipped In the upper part with a protective grid 5_which is attached to the pneumatic device 3. The protective grid 5 serves to protect the device against penetration of the foreign objects into the fan blade space 4. The fan 4 generates airflow and blows it into the pneumatic device 3, in which lower part the partition member 7 is located that is in the shape of truncated pyramid or truncated cone. The dividing element 7 in the shape of pyramid or cone ensures even division of the airflow in all directions. The fan drive 4 is provided with a hydraulic motor 13. In the lower part of the pneumatic device 3 there is airflow outlet which is equipped with rectifying flaps 6 in the horizontal direction and rectifying flaps 8 in the vertical direction. Rectifying flaps 6 and rectifying flaps 8 serve to direct the airflow to critical places on the surface of the agricultural machine, and their position can be adjusted by rotation in revolving hinges 12 or by means of positioning screws 11.

Industrial applicability

The device for continuous cleaning of the surface of an agricultural machine from plant residues or other impurities is industrially usable to reduce the risk of fire occurrence from dry plant residues or other impurities in the field of friction clutches of the agricultural machine.