Competing Hydraulics Work Together in Tractors
Researchers at Purdue University are working to propel the agricultural industry with advances in hydraulic systems optimization.
“Fluid power is everywhere,” said Andrea Vacca, Purdue’s Maha Fluid Power Faculty Chair . “It’s used in airplanes, in cars, and in all kinds of heavy equipment. A tractor is an example of a vehicle that uses fluid power to actuate everything from the steering and propulsion, to powering the implements it pulls behind it.”
Transcript
00:00:09 -Here we have an example of a tractor and a planter, where all the actuations are essentially fluid power systems. All the steering, the propulsion, all the functions that are in the planter, like the cylinders that press the planter down, fertilizer and everything is actuated by a fluid power system. -The current system with the tractor and planter, as they work together, there's a conflict in control. The hydraulic controls fight each other. And it makes the tractor always run under extremely high power. -So our solution is to try to find a way to make these two talk to each other, and have a good understanding what the planter needs, and then the tractor can supply just enough. Now in this way we can bump up efficiency and cut off loss. -A three-phase approach to this. First there was modeling and system characterization. -Develop a model and validate it, and test out
00:01:03 the solutions first in a model to show proof of concept before going to the field to test it out. If the model is showing promising improvement of efficiency and power loss savings, then we see that, let's go to the real machines and test it out in the field. -This has been really my first time having to drive the tractor, and especially run the planter. There's quite a lot going on. There's a lot of controls to manage. Not to mention the sheer power of driving a 25,000-pound tractor with a 10,000-pound planter hooked to it. -Testing is definitely a two-man job. Because when we run a test, we have this computer and we have another computer that runs the planter. And so one person steers, runs the remote valves over here that control the planter functions. And then one person works the laptops. I'm usually the person with the laptop, so I'm switching between computers, starting different recording systems.
00:01:58 From that we can figure out where losses occur, where inefficiencies are, and track what's happening in our system with surprising precision. -After seeing that my model was practicing correct results, and also showing a great improvement, that was really a happy moment for me. The highlight of my PhD! -We are very lucky at Purdue because at Maha we have a lot of lab space where we can do modifications with these large machines. And then we can use the farms that the College of Agriculture has for mainly research purposes, and we can do this kind of test thanks to them. -I find it's really a very interesting system to work on. It has so much potential in these hydraulic systems. Although it's a well established field, there are still a lot of unknown areas. We have new projects every year. We're actually proposing new architectures, new methods of connecting
00:02:50 all different components to create new ideas that's much more efficient, much more powerful. -For reducing fuel consumptions, reduce the greenhouse gases and everything like that. So I really feel like I'm contributing to an area that is doing good. -Feeling that your idea can really get to the field is really an accomplishment. I feel really great for myself, my students, and that is really the best part of our work.