REAPING MACHINE FOR REAPING WHOLE STRAW

Abstract: A machine for whole straw reaping of corn or other crops. Especially a machine in which corn which is fed into a cutter where it is chopped up by means of a number of knives (20) on a rotating cylinder (2) against a fixed cutter (27) is cut off. The cylinder is divided into a number of identical sections and the knives are arranged in replaceable holders (16). The holders (16) are so designed that they have a well defined shape with the result that the holders (16) and thus also the knives (20) can be located in a well-defined manner on the cylinder. Furthermore the holders are so designed that they can be fixed easily and precisely in a grinding machine for regrinding of the knives (20).

Description: REAPING MACHINE FOR REAPING WHOLE STRAW TECHNICAL FIELD The invention relates to a machine for whole straw reaping of corn or other crops, that is to say the reaping of grain and straw and husks or the corresponding growth components of crops which do not comprise cereals, in which the knives which chop up the corn into short even lengths are arranged in replaceable hol¬ ders on a cylinder so that the said knives arranged in their hol¬ ders outside the machine can be reground (sharpened) to the de¬ sired knife height. BACKGROUND At present conventional reaping methods consist fundamentally of the following working sequence. The corn is cut off by a cutting device and transported across a cutting table via an elevator to a cylinder with beater shoes. By means of the rotating beater shoes the grain is threshed out, after which the grain is separated from the straw and husks in straw shakers and cleaning machanisms. Sub¬ sequently the straw can be processed in different ways, e.g. it can be laid back on the field, possibly after fine chopping, or packed into bales. It has also been proposed, and practiced to some extent, that an alternative method be employed for reaping cereals and similar crops. The basis of this method is to utilise the whole of the straw in the reaping machine and in conjunction therewith to chop the corn into short, even lengths so that in a terminal the corn can be separated into its various fractions, i.e. the grain on its own, the husks on their own and the straw portions on their own. In this connection it is important that the reaping machine is so designed that the majority of the grain, when the corn is threshable, is threshed out before the corn is chopped up into small pieces. During reaping it is not possible to avoid stones and other hard particles becoming mixed with the straw which is OMPI WIPO introduced into the machine, with the result that the knives which are to chop up the corn, have to be reground (sharpened) frequently. In machines employed hitherto regrinding is a time-consuming and expensive procedure in those cases where the cylinder on which the knives are mounted has to be removed from the machine for regrinding. Machines employed hitherto are so designed that the knives are certainly replaceable and thus can be reground outside the machine. During such grinding, which as such is not excessively expensive, the problem arises however that correct replacement of the knives on the cylinder requires time—consuming and expensive adjustment work. The adjustment work furthermore requires such craft skills that these are frequently not available at the loca¬ tion where the reaping machines are being used. DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The aim of the invention is to provide a method and a reaping machine which largely eliminates the problems mentioned above and the restrictions imposed by existing methods and machines. In accordance with the invention this can be achieved in that the knives are arranged in replaceable holders on the cylinder and in that the said holders have a well defined shape and position on the cylinders which means that the knives reground in the holder can together with the holder be placed on the cylinder directly and without extra adjustments after grinding. Further aims and characteristics of the invention are described in the patent claims, also by the following description of a pre¬ ferred embodiment. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS In the following description of a preferred embodiment reference will be made to the appended diagrams in which Fig. 1 gives a side view which illustrates the machine in accor- dance with the invention, Fig. 2 gives a side view of a threshing and chopping cylinder form¬ ing part of the machine, Fig. 3 shows on a larger scale and in sectional view a portion of the said cylinder viewed in the axial direction, arid Fig. 4 provides a view IV-I in fig. 3. In the diagrams certain details have been omitted so as to provide improved understanding of the essentials of the invention. BEST MODE OF CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION With reference initially to fig. 1 a machine housing is generally designated as 1. In the machine housing 1 there is a cylinder 2 with horizontal rotating shaft, the cylinder hub being designated as 3. On the underside of the cylinder 2 there is a piece of plate 4 which forms the base of the machine housing. Two girders for mounting the machine housing 1 on a working vehicle have been de¬ signated as 5 and 6. In the feeder portion 7 of the machine hous- ing 1 two feeder rolls 8 and 9 are provided. The upper roll 8 is provided with teeth whilst the lower roll 9 has a smooth surface, all with the objective of providing more efficient feeding. Further on in the feeder section 7 there is an elevator 10 of conventional design. A base plate in the elevator 10 is designated as 11, a number of endless chains provided with fingers are designated 12 and a guide roll is designated 13. The cylinder 2 is divided up into a number of sections A-F, which are separated by end plates 14 and intermediate walls 15, fig. 2. The plates 14, 15 are welded to the hub 3. In each section A-F between the end plates 14 and the adjacent intermediate walls 15, or between adjacent intermediate walls 15, six knife holders 16 are provided. The knife holders 16 are screwed to lugs 17 on the sides of the intermediate walls 15 of end plates 14 by means of bolted connections 18, fig. 3 and fig. 4. OMPI ,. WIPO << The knife holders 16 consist of an element of essentially parallel- epipedic shape and with a length which extends over the length of the cylinder section. A pair .of holes for the screw connections 18, also a groove 19 for a knife 20 and a tensioning wedge 21, also three holes for screws 22 arranged to interact with the tensioning wedges 21 so as to clamp the knives 20 firmly extend through the knife holders 16. The knife holders 16b in the section B are some¬ what displaced in relation to the knife holders 16 in section A. The knife holders 16c are displaced in a corresponding manner with respect to the knife holders 16b etc., as indicated in fig. 2. The location of the knife holders 16 in the cylinder 2 is defined by reference planes 31 and 32 which are plane surfaces in pairs of common planes on lugs 17 which are related pair-wise. In the axial plane in relation to the axis of rotation of cylinder 2 the location of the knives is governed by threaded holes provided for the screws 18. To ensure precise and well-defined location of the knife holders 16 in the cylinder 2, this is so manufactured that the line of intersection 34 is parallel with the axis of rotation of cylinder 2, which signifies that also the reference planes 31 and 32 and the corresponding surfaces of the lugs 17 are so machined that they are parallel with the axis of rotation of cylinder 2. In fig. 3 a dash-dotted line symbolises an imaginary plane 33 which includes the line of intersection 34 and the axis of rotation of cylinder 2. To obtain a well-defined positioning of all knife hol¬ ders 16 in the radial plane in relation to the axis of rotation of cylinder 2 and in relation to the fixed cutting blade 27 it is necessary that the angles α and 6 in fig. 3 are identical for all knife holders 16. Here the angle α is the angle which is formed between the reference plane 32 and the imaginary plane 33. The angle β is the angle between the reference plane 31 and the imaginary plane 33. In fig. 3 the distance between the reference plane 31 and the edge OMPI of knives 20 is designated as d_.The distance cl can, in conjunc¬ tionwith the grinding of the knives which during this are mounted in the holders 16, be maintained without difficulty so that the distance d_ is kept within close tolerances. The beater shoes 25 consist of radial plate sections welded between the intermediate walls 15 or end plates 14 and the adjacent inter¬ mediate wall 15 resembling blades in a fan wheel. The radial extent of the beater shoes 25 is somewhat less than the radial extent of the knives 20. The difference in the radial direction has been de¬ signated as _d, fig. 3. In the machine housing 1 a fixed cutter blade 27, fig. 1, is also provided which can be removed through an aperture 28 in the end wall of the machine housing 1. A knife holder is designated as 29. The functioning of the reaping machine is as follows. The corn is initially inserted in a known manner against a knife table, not shown, with an elevator and is cut off close to the ground sur¬ face by a knife. The cut off corn is then fed towards the centre of the machine, which can take place using devices which form part of state of the art, after which the corn which is concentrated towards the centre is fed upwards in the elevator 10 by means of the endless chains and their fingers, which press the corn against the baseplate 11 in elevator 10. In the feeder section 7 the corn is fed with the ears first into the roll nip 30 between the two feeder rolls 8 and 9, and from the roll nip 30 the corn is fed, still with the ears first, outwards across the fixed knives 27. When the ears have passed the knives 27 in the majority of cases they meet some of the threshing shoes 25 and are beaten by this threshing shoe, the threshing effect being amplified in that the ear is also affected by the oppositely-directed impact force from the fixed cutter 27. The beater shoe 25 then passes by the edge of the fixed cutter blade 27 which faces the cylinder without the grain in the ear being damaged. The cutting off of the ear and of the remaining portions of the straw then takes place only after one of the knives cuts off the ear/straw against the fixed cutter blade 27. Thus by arranging the beater shoes between the knives it is possible to reduce the risk that the ears will first be encoun- tered by one of the knives and cut off so that also the grain will be damaged, and this risk can also be further reduced in that the beater shoes 25 are arranged more closely together and/or by arrang¬ ing a further beater shoe directly in front of each knife. When a knife is to be reground (sharpened) the complete knife holder 16 is released, and then a spare knife holder with a new or reground knife can be inserted immediately in place of the first knife and knife holder. The arrangement of releasable knife holders facilitates the possibility of grinding the knives outside the machine to the right height relative to the fixed cutting blade and by this means pre-adjusting the cutting blade to a fixed dimension. This means that outrage times on the part of the machine can be reduced considerably, whilst at the same time the power demand can be reduced because of the high precision achievable as regards the setting of the cutters. As the reaped material is threshed and cut by beater shoes and knives, gradually the material is thrown upwards through a discharge pipe 31, the beaters/beater shoes 25 functioning as the impelling device. Since the knives 16a, 16b, 16c, etc. in the various sections A-F are mutually displaced, the mode of operation of the machine is extremely smooth, which also contributes towards reducing the power demand. OMPI _

Claims: PATENT CLAIMS 1. Machine for whole straw reaping of corn or other crops in which the corn which is fed into a cutter is cut off, where the corn is chopped up by means of a number of knives on a rotating cylinder (2) against a fixed cutter (27), where the said cylinder (2) is sub-divided in the axial plane into a number of preferably iden¬ tical sections A-F, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the knives (20) are arranged in replaceable holders (10) on the cylinder (2), that the said holders (10) have a well-defined shape and location 10 on the cylinder (2) and that the location of the knives (20) in the holders (16) and the design of the holders (16) are suitable for fixing the holders (16) in a grinding machine for regrinding (sharpening) the knives (20). 15 2. Machine as in claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the cylinder (2) is provided with a number of plane reference surfaces (31, 32) designed for locating the said holders (16) on cylinders (2) and. that the said reference surfaces (31, 32) have a well-de¬ fined location in relation to the axis of rotation of the cylinder. 20 3. Machine as in claim 2, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the said plane reference surfaces (31, 32) are parallel with the axis of rotation of the cylinder (2). 25 4. Machine as in claim 3, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the said plane reference surfaces (31, 32) for each of the knife hol¬ ders (16) are located in two reference planes (31, 32) which are mutually at right angles and that the line of intersection (34) between the said reference planes (31, 32) comprises generatrices 30 of an imaginary cylindrical casing surface which has the axis of rotation of the cylinder (2) as the axis of symmetry. 5. Machine as in claim 4, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that within each section the said lines of intersection (34) between the re- OMPI ference planes (31, 32) are so arranged along the said imaginary cylindrical casing surface that the distance between each of the said lines of intersection (34) and the nearest said line of in¬ tersection (34) is identical. 5 6. Machine as in claim 5, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that the two complementary angles α , 6 , which are formed for each of the said lines of intersection between the said reference planes (31, 32) and a plane which includes the said line of intersection 10 (34) and the axis of rotation of the cylinder are identical for all lines of intersection (34).. 7. Machine as in claim 6, c h a r a c t e r i s e d in that for each of the said lines of intersection (34) one of the said re- 15 ference planes (31, 32) coincides with the plane which is formed between the said lines of intersection (34) and the axis of rota¬ tion of the cylinder(2). _OMPI

Inventors: HIELM ODD W
Applicants: HIELM ODD W, SCANDINAVIAN FARMING AB
Application year: 1982
Main classification: A01D55
IPC codes: A01F29