EFERTILIZER APPLICATOR EVALUATION USING THE RESPONSE SURFACE METHODOLOGY

Ismail, Z. Ebrahim

doi:10.21608/mjae.2011.102561

EFERTILIZER APPLICATOR EVALUATION USING THE RESPONSE SURFACE METHODOLOGY

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Z. Ebrahim Ismail

Prof. of power technology and farm machinery, Agric. Eng. Dept., Mansoura University, Egypt.

10.21608/mjae.2011.102561

Abstract

During the last decade, a great deal of attention gave to reclaim new lands (desert lands) and grow these lands by vegetable crops whereas these crops are considered to be high income in short rotation. Further, increase in vegetables production by increasing the yield per unit area is required by controlling the amount of fertilizer application. The fertilizer machine used in experiments is a banded type applicator consisting of a fertilizing hopper, metering device, agitator unit, fertilizer tubes, forming profile unit and transmission system. Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was employed to optimize the operating (peripheral speed of the auger, the gate area levels and auger volume) and constructional-related variables (fertilizer application rate). The design in this study is a Central Composite Design "CCD" by which it studied the influence of three factors in 15 runs at which three levels for each independent variable. These levels were coded "-1"; "0" and "+1" respectively. The design is to be run in a single block, to provide protection against the effects of turning variables, the order of experimental has been fully randomized. The optimum levels of the auger peripheral speed "A_s", auger volumetric capacity "A_v" and gate area "G_a" for three different fertilizer types are very close and they are in good agreement. For Super phosphate as example there were 5 m/s, 45 cm³ and 40 cm² respectively. The highest value of discharge rate for Urea is 159.6 kg/h that obtained at orifice gate area of 48 cm², auger volume of 50 cm³ and feeding shaft rotational speed of 10 m/s. Increasing the gate area from 16 to 48 cm² increases the volumetric efficiency from 64.9 % to 79.0 %; from 68.6 to 79.7, and from 39.4 % to 51.2 % for Urea, Nitrate and Super-phosphate respectively.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Agricultural Power and Machinery Engineering

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