Harvesters – Cotton – Strippers
Reexamination Certificate
2000-06-30
2002-05-07
Pezzuto, Robert E. (Department: 3671)
Harvesters
Cotton
Strippers
C056S034000, C056S127000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06381937
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to cotton harvesters and more specifically to a broadcast cotton harvester capable of harvesting a wide swath of cotton in a single pass. The present invention specifically relates to broadcast cotton harvesters using multiple header units arranged as a single header assembly wherein each header unit has a plurality of stripper bars to strip cotton from broadcast cotton stalks.
Broadcast cotton is planted differently from the way conventional cotton is planted. Conventional cotton is planted in rows usually thirty-six to forty inches apart. The seed rate in row planted cotton usually ranges from nine to sometimes twenty-five pounds per acre. This allows the amount of seed per foot of row to range from three seed per foot to as many as fifteen or more seed per foot. The problem with this style of planting cotton is that the plants are crowded into a row so that they can be harvested with a stripper row header. This crowding of the plants limits their aggregate production. Row cotton consists of a crowded row of plants and a wide space between rows that is left unproductive. However, until now, row cotton was necessary in order to harvest the crop with a minimal amount of waste.
Broadcast cotton can be planted in any width row, or even not in a row at all. The idea of broadcast cotton is to spread the plants out across the land so that ideally an even distance from one plant to the next is acquired. Plants that are evenly spread out utilize their environment better and produce better yields. Broadcast cotton has been proven to utilize water, fertilizer, and land better than row cotton. The number of plants per acre can be increased without crowding the plants. The leaf canopy of the crop keeps the ground shaded, cool, and moist. Therefore, water is utilized better because the land is shaded by the dispersed plant population. This also allows irrigation water or rain to be readily soaked into the ground and stored where the sun cannot heat the ground and evaporate the water. The leaf and plant canopy shading the ground also helps keep weeds from germinating and growing to compete with the cotton crop as a result of a lack of sunlight. The plant population of broadcast cotton will usually be double that of the row cotton for the same land quantity and quality, water availability, fertilizer application, weed control, chemicals, or other management input. The broadcast cotton plants are usually smaller than row cotton. However, cotton plants that are too large are also a problem. The small cotton plants or cotton plants that are too large combined with the random placement of the plant population has posed a problem for harvesting in the past. The broadcast cotton harvesting headers of the past have at best left much cotton unharvested and wasted in the field. Not enough growth in height of the cotton plant and too much uncontrolled growth of the cotton plant or weeds have been a major concern of the past when planting and harvesting broadcast cotton. The stripper headers of the broadcast cotton harvester of the past had to have optimum conditions in order to function at even a less than acceptable level. Weeds of any size, cotton plants that are too short or too tall, unlevel or rough ground, not enough production to push the cotton into a cotton harvester header, too much moisture in the plant stalk, cotton still too green after defoliation, or the combination of these problems with yet others have plagued the harvesting process of broadcast cotton. The theory of broadcast cotton being more productive is generally accepted by all producers, but harvesting in the past has been inefficient, difficult, and not productive.
There are discussed below various prior patents relating to harvesting combine machines.
Deutsch, et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,018,938 discloses a row cotton harvester which includes eight or more brush type row units mounted on a cross auger system having a split cross auger structure with two auger portions for moving material inwardly toward a central location. Cotton is conveyed through the rear of the central location into two separation chambers, one for each auger portion, and into the lower portions of two corresponding conveying ducts which extend upwardly and outwardly at bend locations located just above the rockshaft and below the cab floor. Each duct includes a nozzle directing air upwardly above the bend location so that cotton is sucked into the bend. Garter, et al. U.S. Pat. No. 5,115,628 discloses a height control system for a cotton harvester which adjusts the elevation of a harvesting unit supported for vertical movement. The height control system includes a signal receiving apparatus movable within a range of movement and arranged in combination with a lift mechanism for adjusting the elevation of the harvesting unit. A signal transmitting mechanism carried on the harvesting unit for ground engagement is connected to the signal receiving apparatus for causing the lift mechanism to effect harvesting unit elevation correlated with vertical movement of the signal transmitting mechanism relative to the harvesting unit. A linkage assembly interconnects the signal receiving apparatus and signal transmitting mechanism. Mitchell U.S. Pat. No. 4,313,296 discloses a broadcast cotton stripper harvester in which cotton bolls, along the fingers of the cotton stripper, are brushed upward to the conveyor by brushes mounted upon chains which run on sprockets on either side of the fingers. The speed of the brushes along the finger is slower than the speed of the stripper along the ground and also slower than 300 feet per minute to prevent throwing the light fluffy cotton from the stripper. Jensen, et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,147,016 disclose a broadcast cotton stripper harvester which comprises a cotton stripper, a plurality of cotton stripping fingers are mounted in parallel, spaced-apart relation along the length of a tube having its opposite ends secured to the opposite ends of a housing for the head of the apparatus. A different sensor mounted on each of the opposite ends of the array of stripper fingers varies one of a pair of valves accordingly. The valves are included in circuits coupled to a source of pressurized fluid so as to vary the pressure in respective ones of a pair of cylinders extending between opposite ends of the elongated tube of the head and a hollow, auger-containing housing mounted on a frame extending from a vehicle. The auger housing has opposite ends on which are pivotably mounted the opposite ends of the housing for the head. The cylinders respond to variations in fluid pressure as provided by the respective height sensors to vary the length thereof and thereby the distance between the associated end of the elongated tube and the auger housing. Variations in the distances result in twisting of the tube so as to twist or distort the generally planar array of stripper fingers which are mounted on the tube. Burris, et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,927,511 discloses modifying a conventional combine harvester for the harvesting of cotton by installing a cotton stripping head on the machine platform, just as it is necessary to install a cornhead on the combine when converting the combine from a wheat harvesting to a corn harvesting operation. The stripping head takes the form of a plurality of fairly closely spaced stripping fingers which project forwardly from the front of the machine to pass beneath the cotton bolls so that two fingers are operable to pluck the boll from the main stalk as the machine is advanced across a cotton field. The fingers are mounted to extend across the entire front of the platform over a width of approximately 15 feet so that the machine is equally well adapted to the harvesting of row planted cotton or broadcast cotton or is capable of harvesting cross-wise of row planted cotton. A flail-like reel is mounted for rotation above the fingers to feed the stripped bolls rearwardly into the conventional feeder house of the combine. Bauert U.S. Pat. No. 1,368,014 discloses combs of str
Carvellas, Esq. Perry
Kovács Árpád F
Pezzuto Robert E.
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