Abstract:
In the field of agriculture, an advanced application of technology has taken full force as
large scale of farms are nowadays manned with tractors, cultivators, harvesters, and other
farm equipment. However, due to the high cost of maintenance coupled with past failures
of tractor mechanization schemes, farmers need reliable and low cost agricultural tools
that may be hand driven or bullock driven for small scale farming in Northern Ghana.
The object of this paper is to re-design an improved animal drawn plough to complement
tractor services. Autodesk Inventor and ANSYS software were used for the design and
analysis of the models. Material of high quality was selected for the proposed model and
appropriate engineering design principles were adopted in designing it. The selected
material (Low alloy steel, AISI 4140) was used for the new model and compared with the
existing cast iron designs. The analytical comparison of the two models shows that, the
low alloy steel (AISI 4140) made share and mouldboard exhibits favorable results. The
percentage difference in terms of total deformations were found to be 40.8% and 40.64%,
and the equivalent elastic strain of about 41.24% and 41.46% respectively in favour of
the low alloy steel (AISI 4140) made share and mouldboard. The implication is that, the
cast iron models will deform and reach the yield point faster than the low alloy steel
models. The results of this study predict that the low alloy steel (AISI 4140) could be a
suitable material for making farm implements such as mouldboard ploughs because the
factor of safety of the low alloy steel (AISI 4140) made share is 1.4 and mouldboard is
1.8 however, the cast iron share has a factor of safety of 0.3 and the mouldboard having
0.4. The results of the developed model could be useful for the design and subsequent
fabrication of new tillage tools adaptable to different types of soil, in terms of application.
Description:
A Thesis in the Department of Mechanical and Automotive Technology Education,
Faculty of Technology Education, Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in
Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Award of the Degree of Master of
Philosophy (Mechanical Engineering Technology) in the University of Education,
Winneba