Performance Evaluation of Tractor Operated Flail Type Forage Harvester Having Chaffing System on Maize Fodder

Fodder harvesting, transporting and its chopping is a major resource consuming component in dairy farming business. To do these three operations simultaneously, a tractor operated flail type forage harvester-cum-chopper was developed. However, the machine could not become popular with the farmers because of uneven size of cut of fodder. To solve this problem in the existing machine, a tractor operated flail type forage harvester with chaffing system was developed by replacing screw conveyer and blowing-cum-chopping mechanism with belt conveyer and positive feed chaffing system, respectively. The developed machine was evaluated for different forward speeds (3 levels: 2.0, 2.5 & 3.0 km/h) and different conveyer speeds (3 levels: 0.55, 0.70 & 0.85 m/s). The forward speed of 2.0 km/h and conveyer speed of 0.55 m/s was found to be best among all the studied parameters. The weighted size of cut of chopped maize fodder was 3.09 cm. The fuel consumption, height of cut, harvesting efficiency, material capacity and field capacity for maize fodder was 6.25 l/h, 4.8 cm, 98.0%, 6.53 t/h & 0.23 ha/h.