Design and Evaluation of a Small Axial Flow Sunflower Thresher Unit

The design of a small axial flow sunflower thresher for tractor installation needs to be developed and evaluated to obtain performance data suitable for sunflower seed production in Thailand.Therefore, the purpose of this research is to design and evaluate a small axial flow sunflower thresher.The design of this unit was done according to the concept of a plant thresher machine, which consists of a set of rotor drums and threshing sieves.The performance of the small axial flow sunflower thresher was evaluated in terms of sunflower moisture in the range of 8.92 to 21.72%, feed rate in the range of 800 to 1,600 kg/h, and linear rotor speed of spike-teeth in the range of 6 to 14 m/s.Evaluation of the threshing unit showed that these three factors had a statistically significant effect on sunflower threshing performance.The optimal parameters to achieve maximal performance are as follows.First, the sunflower moisture content should be in the range of 12 to 14% on a wet basis.Second, the feed rate should be in the range of 1,000 to 1,200 kg/h.Last, the linear velocity of the threshing rotor should range from 10 to 12 m/s.This will achieve greater than 98% threshing efficiency with threshing losses and grain breakage of less than 2%.Future research should investigate additional factors influencing the separation and cleaning of axial flow sunflower thresher machines.