Design of key components for a new rapeseed windrower

Rapeseed cutting and sunning are important processes associated with rapeseed harvesting in China. However, existing rapeseed windrowers have problems such as a tendency to entangle rapeseed plants, low laying quality, low operational efficiency, and high cutting power consumption for tall rapeseed plants. Hence, a new type of rapeseed windrower was designed. A new cutter with a planetary gear driving double moving cutting bars was designed, a motion model of the planetary gear mechanism was established, and the motion and structural parameters of the cutter were analysed. A theoretical analysis of this new cutting system showed that it not only had low cutting impact, minimal disturbance to rapeseed stalks, and high cutting continuity, but also low power consumption and stable operating performance. A reel based on a double-crank planar five-link mechanism was designed, and kinematics modelling and analysis of the new reel were carried out. The structure and motion parameters for the new reel were obtained. Finally, field experiments were conducted on both the newly designed rapeseed windrower and the original one. The results indicated that the newly designed windrower was suitable for high-quality, efficient cutting and sunning operations for tall rapeseed plants.