Effect of Airflow Field in the Tangential-Longitudinal Flow Threshing and Cleaning System on Harvesting Performance

The threshing and cleaning device in the grain combine harvester is located in the same airtight space, and the air flow field in it should also be studied and tested as a whole system. In order to study the distribution of air flow field and the influence of working parameters on the air flow field in the internal space of threshing and cleaning system, the method of predicting harvest performance indexes (grain loss rate and grain impurity rate) by air flow field analysis was explored. First of all, taking the longitudinal grain combine harvester of our research group as the test object and taking the rotating speed of centrifugal fan, the angle of fan plate, the opening of chaffer, and the rotating speed of threshing cylinder as the research factors, the internal space flow channel model of threshing and cleaning system under different working conditions was established and CFD software was used to simulate and analyze the air flow field. At the same time, the hot wire anemometer is used to measure and verify the distribution of air flow field in the threshing and cleaning system under various working conditions. Then, the harvest performance index of the threshing and cleaning system under the rated feeding rate is tested under the corresponding working conditions to find the relationship between the distribution of air flow field and harvest performance, put forward the corresponding analysis and prediction methods, and establish the mathematical relationship model between the simulated air flow field and harvest performance index. The results of simulation and experiment show that the average air velocity can more accurately reflect the cleaning performance. The mathematical function of the relation curve is Y = 11.71X − 4.76, and the prediction error is within 9.4%. The air velocity in the middle area of the vibrating screen is approximately in proportion to the cleaning performance, which provides the theoretical and experimental basis for the design of the threshing and cleaning device and the adjustment of the working parameters in the field harvest. In addition, it can save the design time and cost and reduce the seasonal impact of field experiment.