DEVELOPMENT OF AN ELECTRONIC SENSOR FOR DATE SORTING BASED ON MOISTURE CONTENT

Ismail, K.M.; Al-Gaadi, K.A.

doi:10.21608/mjae.2009.107578

DEVELOPMENT OF AN ELECTRONIC SENSOR FOR DATE SORTING BASED ON MOISTURE CONTENT

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

K.M. Ismail ¹
K.A. Al-Gaadi ²

¹ Professor at the Univ. of Alex., Dept. of Agric. Eng., Alex., Egypt.

² Associate Professor at King Saud Univ., Dept. of Agric. Eng., Precision Agriculture Research Chair (PARC), Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

10.21608/mjae.2009.107578

Abstract

An electronic date moisture sensor utilizing a Wheatstone bridge circuit and an operational amplifier as a signal conditioner was developed. The sensor was designed to produce a voltage output that was proportional to date moisture content. The voltage output was amplified to activate a DC motor, which in turn could be used to operate a date separating device. Samples of dates of four different local types (Sokari, Rawthana, Om Al-Khashab and Nabtit-Aly) were used at different moisture contents to establish a correlation between the sensor voltage output and date moisture contents. The voltage output was found to be proportional to date moisture content. An output of less than 5.5v was associated with date moisture contents ranging between 2.5% and 26%. However, the voltage output was higher than 6v was associated with date moisture contents of 38% and above.

Main Subjects

Processing Engineering of Agricultural Products

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