Design and Fabrication of a Hand-Held Soil Auger Planter for Plantation Crop Seedlings

 Roger C. Montepio¹ and Arsenio N. Resurreccion²

 

ABSTRACT

This is part 1 of a larger paper which presents the comprehensive design, fabrication and evaluation of a workable auger blade of a hand-held soil auger planter for plantation crops using locally available materials. The perform­ance of the machine may be critically affected by its auger blade design. Large applications of soil auger planter are hole-boring for agricultural plantation crop seedlings of banana, mango, citrus, coconut, and even for bulb and mangrove seedling. It can be used also in preparing holes for fence and sign post and for deep root fertilization of existing plantation crops. Four auger blades were designed and fabricated at the Agricultural Machinery and Farm Power Division, Institute of Agricultural Engineering, College of Engineering and Technology, University of the Philippines Los Baños. In this study, the workability and performance of the four blades were evaluated in terms of its drilling rate and quality of drilled-hole. The qualities of drilled-hole were evaluated based on the volume of soil left or flowed back and the smoothness of the wall side. The fabricated prototype is operated by single operator, however two operators are recommended for easy operation. Selected blades with potential quality and better performance will be improved and will be further studied.

Keywords: soil auger planter, auger, crop seedlings, auger planter

¹Ph.D. Student and ²Professor, Agricultural Machinery and Farm Power Division, Institute of Agricultural Engineering, College of Engineering and Agro-Industrial Technology, University of the Philippines Los Baños, 4031 College, Laguna, Philippines.