AN EFFICIENT HARVEST LINE FOR SHORT ROTATION COPPICES WITH A NEW MOWER-CHIPPER

  • 1 Leibniz-Institute for Agricultural Engineering Potsdam-Bornim e.V. (ATB)

Abstract

The cultivation of short rotation coppice (SRC) such as poplar and willow on agricultural land is of increasing interest for farmers. But high investment costs, high processing costs, low flexibility of the machines as well as high machine weights are problems, which hinder an extensive implementation. Therefore, the development of a simple and low weight mower-chipper was started. The chipper was designed for mounting in front of medium sized standard tractors. The new developed machine has been tested in three harvest periods.

Because of the very promising test results an industrial production is in preparation. To analyse the storage behaviour of wood chips different outdoor storage experiments were carried out at practice scale. Storage of coarse wood chips from the mower-chipper was compared with storage of fine chips produced by a forage harvester. Only small differences were found between both chip sizes.

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