Development of the controller based seed cum fertilizer drill

The aim of development of this machine was to sow the seed and fertilizer quantity accurately. In the present seed drills power is taken from spokes wheel, which skids at some places and the required quantity is not dropped. In the developed seed drill the spokes wheel has been replaced by a 24 V DC motor operating through pulse width modulation (PWM). The speed of tractor is being measured through a proximity sensor installed in the front wheel of the tractor, which is a towed wheel and not having the chance of skid. A 24 teeth wheel is fixed in the front wheel of the tractor, its revolutions are counted and fed to the DC motor through the developed controller. Based on the speed of the tractor motor is operated and this motor controls the speed of the feed shaft for seed and fertilizer separately. The developed controller has options for setting desired parameters for seed and fertilizer. In the modified system the variation in seed rate was observed to be 2.16±0.71% as compared to 10-20% observed in the conventional seed cum fertilizer drills having ground wheel as power source. Similarly the fertilizer rate variation was found to be 1.75±1.53% over the set values.