Mechanical Splitting of Rice Straws (1)

Measuring Methods of Splitting Condition and Energy Efficiency

Abstract

Some measuring methods were determined to recognize the overall splitting condition of rice straws. The overall splitting condition was expressed by two ratios α and β as to increase of areas and direction of splitting.
The values of α were from 6.2 through 9.0 for storaged straw and from 7.2 through 12.5 for new straw. The values of β were from 49 through 78 for storaged straw and from 37 through 68 for new straw. The increase of longitudinal section was remarkable in any cases.
The cross sectional splitting required more energy consumption than that of longitudinal splitting.
Energy efficiency η was determined by the ratio of net splitting energy to practical input energy. The measured values of η were from 0.74 through 1.46 per cent for storaged straw and from 0.56 through 0.77 per cent for new straw.
This fact showed that the most of input energy can be consumed as a heat loss by mechanical friction. And it suggested to us the necessity of investigations on the efficiency improvement.