Harvesting machine

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9974233-B2
Application number	US-201515315522-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 23, 2015
Priority date	Sep 25, 2014
Publication date	May 22, 2018
Grant date	May 22, 2018

Abstract

A harvesting machine includes: a crop tank; a measuring device that measures an amount of crop that has been stored in the crop tank; an unloader apparatus that discharges crop that has been stored in the crop tank; a device control part that executes precise measurement oriented device setting processing; a measurement control part including a precise measurement execution part that performs, precise measurement which involves the precise measurement oriented device setting processing, and a simplified measurement execution part that executes, simplified measurement; an operational instruction processing part that outputs a precise measurement instruction and a simplified measurement instruction in response to an operation performed by a manual operation device; and a measurement result recording part that rewrites a simplified measurement result recorded based on a preceding simplified measurement instruction, with a precise measurement result that is based on a succeeding precise measurement instruction.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A harvesting machine comprising:
a crop tank that temporarily stores crop that the harvesting machine has harvested while travelling over a farm field;
a measuring device that measures an amount of crop that has been stored in the crop tank;
an unloader apparatus that discharges the stored crop out of the crop tank;
a device control part that executes precise measurement oriented device setting processing to create a device state that allows the measuring device to perform precise measurement;
a measurement control part, the measurement control part including: a precise measurement execution part that performs, by the measuring device, precise measurement which involves the precise measurement oriented device setting processing; and a simplified measurement execution part that executes, by the measuring device, simplified measurement which does not involve the precise measurement oriented device setting processing;
an operational instruction processing part that outputs a precise measurement instruction to perform the precise measurement and a simplified measurement instruction to perform the simplified measurement, in response to an operation performed by using a manual operation device; and
a measurement result recording part that, before the unloader apparatus performs crop discharging work, rewrites a simplified measurement result that has been recorded based on a preceding simplified measurement instruction, with a precise measurement result that is based on a succeeding precise measurement instruction.

2. The harvesting machine according to claim 1 ,
wherein the manual operation device includes a simplified measurement switch that sends out a signal for outputting a simplified measurement instruction to the operational instruction processing part, and a precise measurement switch that sends out a signal for outputting a precise measurement instruction to the operational instruction processing part.

3. The harvesting machine according to claim 2 ,
wherein the simplified measurement switch also serves as an activation switch for the unloader apparatus, and a signal for outputting the simplified measurement instruction is sent out upon multiple operations being performed with the activation switch, and a signal that requests activation of the unloader apparatus is sent out upon a single operation being performed with the activation switch.

4. The harvesting machine according to claim 1 ,
wherein, during the precise measurement oriented device setting processing, at least one of: a process of changing an orientation of a vehicle body of the harvesting machine to a horizontal orientation; a process of blocking a driving force to a device for harvesting work; and a process of fixing a device for unloading work at a storage position is executed.

5. The harvesting machine according to claim 1 ,
wherein a conversion table for deriving a yield that is the amount of crop that has been stored in the crop tank, from a measurement value obtained by the measuring device, is built based on data that is transmitted from a management center via a data communication network in response to identification information regarding a farm field that is a harvesting target.

6. The harvesting machine according claim 1 , further comprising:
a display part that displays: a unit yield obtained at each instance of unload work, the unit yield being an amount of crop that has been stored in the crop tank and being calculated from a result of measurement performed by the measuring device; and an integrated yield per farm field, the integrated yield being an integration of unit yields.

7. A combine comprising:
a travelling machine body;
an orientation changing mechanism that changes an orientation of the travelling machine body;
a grain tank that is mounted on the travelling machine body and stores grain that has been transported from a threshing apparatus;
an unloader apparatus that discharges grain that has been stored in the grain tank to an outside from a bottom part of the grain tank;
a load cell that measures a weight of the grain tank;
a yield measurement part that measures a yield of grain that has been stored in the grain tank, based on a result of measurement performed by the load cell;
a zero point adjustment part that performs zero point adjustment processing for the yield measurement part; and
a horizontal orientation control part that controls the orientation changing mechanism upon zero point adjustment processing being started by the zero point adjustment part, so as to bring the travelling machine body into a horizontal orientation.

8. The combine according to claim 7 ,
wherein the unloader apparatus includes: a bottom part screw that is provided on the bottom part of the grain tank; a vertical transport screw conveyer that conveys grain that has been exported by the bottom part screw, in an upward direction; and a horizontal transport screw conveyer that is swingable in a top-bottom direction relative to the vertical transport screw conveyer, the unloader apparatus further including a holding apparatus that fixes the horizontal transport screw conveyer at a home position, and
the holding apparatus fixes the horizontal transport screw conveyer at the home position upon the zero point adjustment processing being started by the zero point adjustment part.

9. The combine according to claim 8 ,
wherein the horizontal transport screw conveyer uses hydraulic pressure to swing in the top-bottom direction, and the holding apparatus uses a gravity fitting method under a condition where hydraulic pressure has been released, to fix the horizontal transport screw conveyer.

10. The combine according to claim 9 ,
wherein if the horizontal transport screw conveyer is located at the home position when the zero point adjustment processing is started by the zero point adjustment part, the horizontal transport screw conveyer is first caused to swing upward using hydraulic pressure, and is then fixed to the holding apparatus using the gravity fitting method under a condition where hydraulic pressure has been released.

11. The combine according to claim 7 ,
wherein the horizontal orientation control part controls the orientation changing mechanism upon completion of the zero point adjustment processing, thereby bringing the travelling machine body into a lower limit orientation in which a height of the travelling machine body relative to a ground is the lowest.

12. The combine according to claim 7 ,
wherein the zero point adjustment processing includes: basic zero point adjustment processing that is performed before factory shipment; temporary zero point adjustment processing that is performed after factory shipment; and a temporary zero point adjustment parameter that is calculated as per the temporary zero point adjustment processing is replaced with a basic zero point adjustment parameter that is calculated as per the basic zero point adjustment processing.

13. The combine according to claim 12 ,
wherein the basic zero point adjustment parameter is recorded on a memory before being replaced with the temporary zero point adjustment parameter, and the basic zero point adjustment parameter is set again upon the temporary zero point adjustment parameter being reset.

14. A combine comprising:
a grain tank that stores grain that has been transported from a threshing apparatus;
a grain discharging apparatus that discharges grain that has been stored in the grain tank to an outside from a bottom part of the grain tank;
a tube-shaped member that is provided inside the grain tank, and forms a grain path that has: an

Assignees

• Kubota Kk

Inventors

• Ueda Mao
• Takahara Kazuhiro
• Ikeda Hiroshi
• Inoue Hirotsugu
• Hamanishi Tadashi
• Iname Yukihiro
• Deguchi Shoma

Classifications

• A01D41/1275 Primary

  for the level of grain in grain tanks · CPC title

• A01D41/1217

  Unloading mechanisms · CPC title

• A01D41/1208 Primary

  Tanks for grain or chaff (for threshing machines A01F12/60) · CPC title

• A01D41/1277

  for measuring grain quality · CPC title

• A01F12/18

  Threshing devices · CPC title