Design, construction and evaluation of preliminarily machine for removing sunflower seeds from the head using air-jet impingement

To design a sunflower machine for removing seeds from sunflower head (SH) based on air-jet impingement, preliminarily model of such machine was designed, constructed and evaluated. Effects of the seed location, angle of impingement, distance between nozzle outlet and sunflower head, and rotational velocity of sunflower head on percentage of extracted seeds were examined. In order to examine the effects of air-jet parameters on percentage of removed seeds in different locations of seed on sunflower head, sunflower heads were divided into three regions, namely central region, middle region and side region. Results indicated that in all three regions, with increasing rotational velocity from 10 to 30 rev/min, percentages of removed seeds from the SH decreased. Results also indicated that in all three regions, with increasing distance between nozzle outlet and SH surface from 10 to 20 mm and decreasing distance between nozzle outlet and SH surface from 40 to 20 mm, percentage of removed seeds from the SH by air-jet increased. Results indicated that in side region, with decreasing angle of impingement from 90% to 30%, of removed seeds from the SH by air-jet increased and in middle and central regions, with increasing angle of impingement from 30º to 60º and decreasing angle of impingement from 90º to 60º, percentages of removed seeds from the SH by air-jet increased. Also in all tests, no seed damaged due to air-jet impinging was observed. Keywords: preliminarily model; angle of impingement; nozzle; rotational velocity; sunflower head; seed locatio