Farm Machinery and Equipment

Introduction to farm mechanization. Classification of farm machines. Introduction to materials used in construction of farm machines. Heat treatment processes and their requirement in farm machines. Selection of farm machinery and cost estimation. Unit operation in crop production. Hitching systems and controls of farm machinery. Introduction to seed-bed preparation. Familiarization with land reclamation and earth moving equipment.

Machinery used for primary tillage, secondary tillage, rotary tillage, deep tillage, minimum tillage and conservation tillage. Draft measurement of tillage equipment, Methods of Ploughing. Identification and major functional components of mould-board plough, disc plough, chisel plough, sub-soiler, harrows, cultivators, Forces acting on tillage implements. Cost of operation of farm machinery.

Introduction to sowing, planting & transplanting equipment. Study of working of seed drills, no-till drills, happy seeder and strip-till drills. Brief description and working of planters. Study of types of furrow openers and metering systems in drills and planters. Calibration of seed-drills/ planters. Adjustments during operation. Introduction to plant protection equipment – sprayers and dusters. Classification of sprayers. Types of nozzles. Calculations for calibration of sprayers and chemical application rates.

Introduction to inter-culture equipments. Weeder – manual and powered, main components and their functional requirement. Study of harvesting operation – methods and terminology. Study of Reapers, Mowers and windrowers – types, working and adjustments. Importance and methods of hay conditioning and calculation of moisture content of hay. Introduction to threshing systems – manual and mechanical systems. Types of threshing drums and their applications. Types of threshers- tangential and axial, factors affecting thresher performance.

Study of grain combines (Wheat and Paddy), combine terminology, Computation of combine losses, study of combine troubleshooting. Chaff cutters and capacity calculations. Study of Root crop diggers –potato and groundnut. Cotton harvesting mechanisms, study of cotton pickers and strippers. Introduction to vegetables and fruit harvesting equipment and tools.