Harvesters – Cornstalk type – Cutters
Reexamination Certificate
1999-11-04
2001-10-09
Shackelford, H. (Department: 3671)
Harvesters
Cornstalk type
Cutters
C056S119000, C056S503000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06298643
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The invention relates to a machine for mowing and chopping corn and similar stalk-like harvested crops.
For such machines, the stalks of the harvested crops are drawn in in the upright position by drawing-in and mowing drums and mown and subsequently supplied to the chopper by the insertion duct, which takes up the cut, harvested crops. In the course of rationalizing the harvesting operation, large, self-propelled field choppers with high outputs are used, the chopper with its knife drum or similar chopping tool being dimensioned correspondingly large. For the chopping tool, this requires a wide insertion duct for the cut, harvested crops with fitting dimensions transversely to the driving direction of the chopper.
An insertion duct, broadened in this manner, presents difficulties during the harvesting operation owing to the fact that the conveying drums, laterally bounding the insertion duct, convey the harvested crops, transported along, mainly in the central region of the insertion duct, while the two outer regions are not supplied. This uneven supplying of the harvested crops results, on the one hand, in uneven wear of the chopping tool and, on the other, due to the concentration of large masses of material in the central region of the insertion duct, overloading of the chopper can occur, which leads to a response of the safety couplings usually provided and, with that, to interruptions of the operation, which delay the harvesting operation.
Attempts to load the insertion duct uniformly over the whole width of the duct with harvested crops simply by placing the lateral conveying drums further apart transversely to the driving direction, were unsuccessful since, by these means, the insertion duct and, with that, the correspondingly wide chopper drum were filled mainly in the two outer, lateral end regions of the insertion duct, while the center of the duct is under-supplied in this case with harvested crops. Uneven wear, associated with the danger of frequent stoppages because of overloading, once again arises this way.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the invention to provide a machine of the type given above, which ensures that the insertion duct of the chopper, especially a wide insertion duct of a high performance chopper, which is dimensioned correspondingly large, is supplied uniformly with the cut, harvested crops.
Owing to the fact that, for this development, the two lateral conveying drums are divided transversely to their vertical axis in each case into an upper and a lower drum body and that the two axes of rotation of the drum bodies of each conveying drum are offset to one another in the transverse direction in such a manner that, in its working position, the upper drum body with its driver gear rim is at a distance from the center of the insertion duct, which exceeds that of the lower drum body, the conveying behavior of the two conveying drums is influenced in such a manner, that the cut, harvested crops, especially in the form of corn plants, are first of all bundled cleanly by the two lower drum bodies of the two conveying drums towards the center of the insertion duct, the possibility being provided to the harvested crops, so bundled, by the outwardly offset upper drum bodies of the two conveying drums to spread out further from the center of the duct towards the outside to the lateral ends of the duct. By these means, the insertion duct is filled uniformly, thus making it possible to enlarge the conveying cross section and, with that, to increase the throughput of harvested crops. As a result, the chopper is no longer stressed non-uniformly and uniform wear results, which favors a long service life of the operating parts of the chopper, and avoids stoppages resulting from overloading the machine by the undesirable balling together of the harvested crops in the regions of the insertion ducts to the chopper.
Advantageously, the conveying behavior of the two lateral conveying drums can further be affected favorably owing to the fact that the two drum bodies of each conveying drum are driven at the same peripheral speed. By these means, a uniform flow of material is maintained in the region of the insertion duct.
Further characteristics and advantages of the invention arise out of the claims and the specification below in conjunction with the drawing, in which an example of the object of the invention is illustrated in greater detail diagrammatically.
REFERENCES:
patent: 5237804 (1993-08-01), Bertling
patent: 6119443 (2000-09-01), Rauch
Wolters Norbert
Wuebbels Richard
Jordan and Hamburg LLP
Maschinenfabrik Kemper GmbH & Co. KG
Shackelford H.
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