Chapter 1

Introduction

Background of the Study

Corn or also called as Maize, cereal plant of the grass family and its edible grain. The

domesticated crop originated in the Americas and is one of the most widely distributed of the

world’s food crops. Corn is used as livestock feed, as human food, as biofuel, and as raw

material in industry. In the United States the colorful variegated strains known as Indian corn are

traditionally used in autumn harvest decorations. Maize is one of the most important cereal crops

in the world agricultural economy. It is originated from Mexico several thousand years back,

even before Columbus landed in South America. It is called as “Queen of cereals” and “King of

fodder” due to its highly importance in human and animal food. It is the raw material and base

for the food and beverage manufacturing industrial products like starch, syrup, alcohol, acids,

food, feed and ethanol. It is a highly rich source of starch (60-80%), protein (8-12%), fat (3-5%)

and minerals (1-2%).

Corn is the second most important crop in the Philippines. 600,000 farm households are

employed in different businesses in the corn value chain. As of 2012, around 2.594 Million ha of

land is under corn cultivation and the total production is 7.408 million metric ton.

Maize reproduces sexually each year. This randomly selects half the genes from a given

plant to propagate to the next generation, meaning that desirable traits found in the crop (like

high yield or good nutrition) can be lost in subsequent generations unless certain techniques are

used.

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 Corn has its own size, shape, starch level and moisture content. It has a hard exterior

shell and a soft starchy center. When heated, the natural moisture inside the kernel turns to

steam and builds up enough pressure that it eventually explodes. Other types of dried corn may

burst open slightly when heated.

Agricultural field mechanization is viewed as valuation of technologies to ensure timely

field operations for growth in productivity, reduce in losses in crops and improvement in the

quality of agro product. Besides the cost effectively, it increases the land and other input

productivity using labor saving and reducing old and drudgery devices. The constraints in

promotion of mechanization include the variable requirement of equipment and tools for each

and every agricultural climatic zone of India, the small and apart land holding, minimum

investment of the farmers, atrocious irrigation techniques, poor status of the farmers and

maintenance facilities of the crops field and crops, etc. (Anon, 2008). It is reported by Singh

(2010) that in India, tillage of fields, sowing or planting and weeding techniques for maize

cultivation has been mechanized by 80-90% whereas, level of mechanization in harvesting and

threshing is below 20%. The farm operations like harvesting, threshing and post-harvest

operations require mechanization and demand the use of suitable and appropriate equipment to

obtain higher operational efficiencies and productivity.

For farmers, corn is hard to strip. It takes up to a week for them to strip a sack of corn.

For agricultural use, corn for them is used as rice, livestock feed and for plantation. Threshing or

shelling is one of the most important crop processing operations which are used to separate the

grains from ear heads and prepare its quality for the market. Maize grain harvesting comprises

the de-husking operation for removal of outer cover and shelling operation for grains from ear

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heads. De-husking of maize involves separation of the husk from the ear head without causing

the damage to grains and shelling involves the removal of maize grain from the cob.

The prevalent shelling and de-husking methods such as rubbing the maize cobs on one

another, rubbing on bricks, stone and wire mesh by using iron cylinder are time consuming

involves drudgery and exposure of crop over a time to natural hazards like rain, fire, animals,

birds and insects leads to losses in quantity and quality of grains. Mechanization of these

activities could well be the answer to overcome these problems.

Thus, in order for farmers to eliminate time on stripping the corn, the researches aim to

construct a machine that has fastest and easiest way to strip a corn.

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Review of Related Literature

Sakun (1963) used wire loop cylinder in place of rasp-bar and found that use of wire loop

cylinder resulted in better threshing performance than using rasp-bar cylinder in threshing of

corns.

Harrington (1980) designed a multi-crop thresher with spike tooth cylinder and inverted

bar type closed concave. He had stated that spike tooth concave helped to breakup bunches better

and provided more complete threshing and separation. Whereas non meshing spike tooth

concave was only practical in the inverted position where gravity provided continuous self-

cleaning.

Ghaly (1985) designed and evaluated the performance of the stationary threshing

machine operated by tractor at Egypt for wheat crop. The feed rate increased with the cylinder

speed 600 to 1000 rpm and decreased with the cylinder speed from 900 to 1100 rpm. For all

cylinder speeds, the feed rate increased linearly as the hole diameter increased from 22 to 45

mm. The hole diameter not having appreciable influence on the seed damage. Increasing the

cylinder speed or decreasing the hole diameter reduced the straw length under chapping section.

Optimum operating condition for threshing wheat decided as 1000 rpm with concave clearance

of 45 mm hole diameter.

Desta and Mishra (1990) developed and conducted performance evaluation of a sorghum

thresher. A combination of feed rate at 3 levels (6, 8, 10 kg min-1 ), cylinder-concave clearance

at 2 levels (7 mm and 11 mm) and cylinder speed at 3 levels viz., 300 rpm (17.5 m s-1 ), 400 rpm

(10.1 m s-1 ), 500 rpm (12.6 m s-1 ) were investigated. The results of performance analysis

showed that threshing efficiency increased with an increase in cylinder speed for all feed rates

and cylinder. The threshing efficiency was found in the range of 98.3 to 99.9%. At recommended

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speed of 400 rpm (10.1 m s-1 ), the power required for operating thresher was 4.95 kW and the

maximum output of the thresher was 162.7 kg h-1 .

Kumar et al. (2002) studied a cost effective, improved design for safe operation of

threshers based on ergonomic principles. The study was done in villages of Sonipat district of

Haryana State and Baraut district of Uttar Pardesh. They interviewed all the injured victims with

serious cuts or amputations taking treatment in nearby hospitals. Found that 4% of victims were

under 16 years, 82% in 16-45 years and 14% over 45 years. The right hand was involved in 80%

cases, left hand was involved in 15% and other body parts 5%. Thirty-five cases involved

amputations of the right hand fingers, right hand, right forearm, left hand fingers and left hand.

They analysed machine parts associated with injuries revealed that the threshing drum and the

feeding system were involved in 52 cases, belt and pulley in 6 cases and rest by any other

machine part.

Danfulani (2009) carried out an investigation on design of a maize shelling machine. He

used a rotating shaft with threshing tooth on the surface to provide the shelling forces required.

The machine designed to shell 5000 kg of maize per day. The prime mover selected as a diesel

engine with a capacity of five hp which could be easily be operated by rural dwellers. The design

was done with readily available materials coupled with minimum cost without affecting the

quality of its output

Hassan et al. (2009) fabricated maize sheller from locally available materials and its cost

was very low and affordable. This machine was constructed to shell maize and separate the cobs

from the grains. Its threshing efficiency was 99.2% and breakage losses were insignificant. The

machine threshes 200 kg of maize in a hour.

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 Singh and Singh (2010) reported that traditionally dehusking of maize cobs were done

manually with hand and shelling was done either by beating the dehusked cobs with sticks or

with fingers. Power operated big size machine were available and were being used by some of

the farmers in different parts of the country. This equipment was suitable for economically

strong group of farmers (medium and large farmers) while in the country, about 80.3% farmers

of marginal and small size groups operate 36% area. In addition to this and to overcome the

problem of erratic supply of electric power, a hand operated maize dehusker-sheller of 100 kg

un-dehusked cob h-1 capacity was designed, developed and fabricated for operation by farm

women with hypothesis that the equipment suitable for women would easily be operated by men

workers.

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Significance of the study

This section will provide brief description on the various significances of the study:

To students. The proposed study serves the students as their reference or guide in creating their

program. It will also help students taking up agricultural to recognize the use or the need of a

machine that eliminates time and effort in the agricultural business.

To farmers. The proposed study will help farmers to eliminate time and effort in corn stripping.

By this study they will come up with easier and faster machine for them.

To Agricultural business. The proposed study will help the agricultural business in making an

easy and convenient machine that have no motor and electricity involved.

To future researcher. The proposed study will benefits and help the future researcher as their

guide. The study can also open in development of this study.

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 Chapter 2

Purpose/ Objective of the Research

The Purpose of this study is to construct a fastest and easiest way on stripping corn.

Specifically, the following questions will be answered:

1. What are the components of the machine that strip the corn easily?

2. How effective is the corn stripping machine?

3. How long does it take to strip a corn from the manual operated corn stripping machine to

the ordinary way of stripping a corn?

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 Chapter 3

Methodology

This chapter briefly describes the methodology used for development of manual operated corn

stripping machine based on considerations of properties of the corn and the details of procedure

adopted for performance evaluation of developed machine. The performance evaluation of newly

developed manual operated corn stripping machine is to be carried out on various corn fields

here in Palompon, Leyte.

The methodology adopted in developing corn stripping machine has been divided into following

sections.

1. Properties of corn

2. Research Design

3. Respondent of the study/ Sample

4. Research Instrumentation

5. Design and development of manual operated corn stripping machine

6. Procedure

1. Properties of Corn

Properties are useful and necessary in the design and operation of various equipment

employed for agricultural operations. Properties of corn varieties considered for the

development of corn stripping machine and presented below. Basic information on these

properties is of great importance and help towards the development of equipment. The

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 development of stripping machine for corn cob requires the knowledge of engineering

properties such as physical (shape and size, roundness and sphericity of corn cob.

1.1 Dimension of the corn cob and grains

For all the varieties of the maize cobs. The length of un-husked cob (mm), stalk length (mm),

number of grain lines in cob, number of grains in one line of the cob, minimum diameter of

cob without grains (mm), maximum diameter of cob without grains (mm), average length of

shelled cob (mm), diameter of un-husked cob (mm) and shape were determined using venire

caliper.

2. Research design

An experimental and descriptive survey research method design will be used in this

study.

The experimental research method design will be used in designing and developing the

machine.

The descriptive survey research method design will determine if the machine is

acceptable for the agricultural use.

3. Respondent of the study/ sample

This study involves farmers who have corn field/plantation here in Palompon, Leyte.

Thus, 20 farmers who work on the corn field are randomly selected for various

observation and survey. Farmers are categorized according to their age (range 18- 50

years old).

4. Research Instrumentation

In designing the said manual operated corn stripping machine, the researchers will use

manual sketching of the machine and label its components and the uses.

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 The researcher will use RULA method in determining if the workers posture is acceptable in

using the manual operated corn stripping machine.

And also in determining the acceptability of the machine in agricultural business, the

researchers will use a descriptive survey research method, where the researchers will be

giving questions on randomly selected workers.

The general design, uses and acceptability of the machine will be based on five point scale.

SCALE FEEDBACK

1 Not at all helpful

2 Not so helpful

3 Somewhat helpful

4 Very helpful

5 Extremely helpful

5. Design and development of manual operated corn stripping tool

During the development of manual operated corn stripping machine, it was kept in mind that

the equipment should be suitable for small, marginal and medium farmers. A machine

designed to help farmers have the fastest and easiest way to strip a corn. The methodology

and procedure adopted in development of different components of corn stripping machine are

presented in this section.

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 4. Procedure

Prepare Materials use and Testing and cutting Assembling, wielding and
Measure Testing

Final Assembling and Paint

Corn Stripping Machine coating

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