Design and testing of modern apple orchard pruning machinery

In response to the problems of low efficiency and difficulty of pruning operations in modern dwarf dense orchards, an adjustable position saw blade pruning machine was designed, mainly consisting of a pruning device, a regulating device and a hydraulic system. Through the mechanical and modal analysis of the circular saw blade, the limit speed of the circular saw blade was derived. A finite element model of the sawing process was established, and a single-factor simulation analysis was conducted for three important parameters: feed rate, circular saw blade speed and branch diameter, and a three-factor, three-level quadratic regression orthogonal test was designed to derive the best matching sawing parameters, which was verified in field tests. The test results showed that the average passing rate was 92.8% at the feed rate of 4 km/h under the circular saw blade speed of 2800 rpm, which was higher than 88.8% at 3 km/h and 88.9% at 5 km/h. The optimum sawing parameters were: the circular saw blade speed of 2800 rpm and feed rate of 4 km/h, which were consistent with the simulation results, and the passing rate of the cut was high at this time, meeting the technical requirements of orchard pruning.