The Shape of the Sugar Beet Seed and Their Seeding Accuracy at the Handy Bean Planters

Abstract

The handy bean planters developed in Hokkaido, are used for the seeding of various bean and sugar beet seeds. The seed-metering device is the inclined-plate cell type. The angle of plate is 50 degree, the diameter is 180mm with 10 cells. The plate thickness for graded whole seed and pelleted seed are 6 and 3mm in respetively
The cell diameter are 9, 11, 13 and 15mm for graded whole seed, 6mm for pelleted seed.
According to the laboratory test from 1959 to 1961, the proper speed of cell is about 0.14m per second. Seeding rate for graded whole seed is 4lb at 14mm in cell diameter. For segmented seed, seeding rate is 2.5lb at 10mm. Proper seeding speed is 0.8m per sec (2.88km per hours). The increase in plate speed means the decrease in seeding rate. When the angle of plate was less than 50 degree, the seeder can be seeding of precision planting. By the use of a smooth metal tubes either rectangle or round type, the bean planter can be used for a kind of drill which are capable precision metering of graded whole seed. For 80cells plastic plate, the pelleted seed was planted at 12 seeds per foot.