Abstract
Sugarcane trash (leaves + tops) removal takes 65% time of manual harvesting. Conventional trash burning in standing crop
wastes all biomass material which can be used for trash farming and as a source of renewable energy to mitigate natural
resources and energy crisis. Shortage of skilled labour and machinery for leaf removal during peak harvesting season causes
late harvesting and about 10% deduction in selling price. A small sugarcane leaf stripping machine was designed and fabricated
to deduce these problems. Main components of stripping machine were intake rollers, cleaning element, out take rollers, power
transmission system and an engine as power source. Three combinations for intake rollers were fabricated. Three velocities
i.e., CE1 (660 rpm), CE2 (763 rpm) and CE3 (1033 rpm) of cleaning element, two level of sugarcane leaf moisture content,
M.C1 (8.2%) and M.C2 (17.60%) and three sugarcane verities, V1 (US-658), V2 (HSF-240) and V3 (CPF-249) were selected
for machine performance evaluation. The results indicated that Inlet roller combination C3, cleaning element speed CE3,
sugarcane crop variety V1, and moisture content MC1 gave 82.43%, 77.06%, 87.72%, and 82.84% cleaning efficiency,
respectively.
