DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF MANUALLY PUSH TYPE USG APPLICATOR

Abstract

To overwhelmed high human strain and tedious work in urea application for rice cultivation, a manually operated push type Urea Super Granule (USG) applicator was designed and developed. There are four small drive wheels inserted in lieu of float which was fabricated using small steel rings instead of the traditional skid concept. The discharge tubes were reformed with the additional bent PVC tubes. The average effective field capacity and field efficiency of the USG applicator was 0.16 ha/hr and 88.1%, respectively. In the laboratory test, the average missing rate, applicator capacity, the distance amid two dropped USG, covering performance and force requirement in developed model were 6.25%, 13.21 kg/hr, 41.61 cm, 77.5% and 69.18 N. The developed applicator saves cost about nineteen times than manual operation. The developed applicator may be useful to small growers of rice growing countries like Bangladesh which not only be cost effective but will also save both time and energy.