Field Tests of the KSU Date Palm Service Machine

Abstract

Dates are one of the most important crops in Saudi Arabia. Many agricultural opera¬tions particularly harvesting, require the man to climb the tree and work at a considerable height above the ground. This is a dangerous operation compounded by a severe labor shortage in the country. The overall size, reach, ground clearance and power required by a machine was decided after a survey of date farms carried out in Saudi Arabia in 1985. The machine consists of an electro-hydraulic controlled basket mounted on a four-wheel-drive chassis. This is driven by a diesel engine to enable the man to be elevated into the tree or power the wheels. A prototype machine has now been manufactured and completed a set of field trials in 1989 and 1990. The output of harvested dates in kg/man hour is greater with the machine than with traditional hand harvesting. However, the machine is much slower to reach a given position in the trees than is the case for traditional harvesting by hand. Ways of improving the speed and operating technique are suggested which should further improve the performance