Studies on the Performance of a Sugarcane Extractor with an Auxiliary Centrifugal Fan

Highlights Theoretically derive the suspension velocity and verifies the accuracy of the calculation formula through experiments. Establish the motion equation to simulate the motion state of sugarcane materials under different initial conditions. Conduct orthogonal experimental tests to investigate the effects of centrifugal fan airflow velocity, centrifugal fan airflow inclination angle, and axial flow fan speed on loss rate and impurity rate, and determines the optimal parameter combination. Conduct comparative experiments to further demonstrate the advantages of adding a centrifugal fan to the original impurity removal device. Abstract. In response to the high cane losses and impurity rates during the harvesting process of chopper harvesters, a centrifugal fan was added to the original impurity removal device to investigate its effect on impurity removal efficiency. The study first derives and verifies the formula for calculating the suspension velocity of materials. Secondly, based on kinematic analysis, the impurity removal process of materials in the cleaning room was analyzed. The differential equations of motion for materials were established and trajectory simulation was carried out to analyze the influence of different factors on material trajectory; Thirdly, the single-factor test and orthogonal combination test were used to investigate the effects of inclined airflow velocity, inclined airflow angle, and axial fan speed on the cane losses and impurity rate. Regression equations of impurity rate and cane losses with inclined airflow speed, inclined airflow angle and axial fan speed were constructed, and the optimal combination of parameters was determined. The optimal parameter combination is an airflow inclination angle of 53°, inclined airflow velocity of 6.45 m s-1, and an axial fan speed of 1580 revolutions per minute (rpm). Finally, a series of experiments were conducted based on the optimized parameter combinations. The experimental results indicate that, under the same feeding rate, the loss rate of the new impurity removal device was 1.83%, and the impurity content was 6.45%, which was a 25.8% decrease in impurity rate compared to the original impurity removal device; Under the condition of maintaining the same impurity rate (6.45%), the cane losses of the original impurity removal device is 57.9% higher than that of the new impurity removal device. The analysis indicates that applying centrifugal fan to the original impurity removal device can effectively improve the performance of the impurity removal device, significantly reducing the cane losses while ensuring the impurity rate meets the standard. Keywords: Cane losses, Centrifugal fan, Impurity rate, Optimization, Orthogonal test, Sugarcane extractor.