Abstract
To achieve high-speed seeding using the conventional inclined-cell-plate soybean seeder now on the market, we need to improve the lling of the holes in the cell plate with seeds. A laboratory experiment showed that the seeding rate (the number of seeds that reached the ground through the holes) increases as the peripheral velocity (PV) of the circle of the seed holes decreases, i.e. as the distance from the center of the inclined-plate to the seed holes. Also, increasing the number of seed holes (to 20-mm intervals) helps to lessen the PV. Furthermore, to achieve a high seeding rate, the seed-hole diameter should be twice the minimum of the average diameters, or 3 to 4mm larger than the maximum of the average lengths, of 100 seeds. The optimum plate thickness was determined to be 1mm thinner than the average seed diameter for large seeds, and the same as the average for small seeds. On the basis of these results, an inclined-cell-plate with 16 holes was made for use with a high-speed double feeder for large seeds and tested in the field. The seeding rate remained high when the PV was below 20 to 25cm/s, achieving a seeder working speed of 1.5m/s. This was twice the speed of the conventional inclined-cell-plate soybean seeder available on the market. We concluded that the new inclined-cell-plate can be used to improve working effciency of the soybean seeder.
