GB1144662A - Means for harvesting black-currants - Google Patents

Abstract

1,144,662. Harvesting black-currants. GEORGE HINDS Ltd. 17 Oct., 1966 [24 July, 1965; 26 July, 1966], Nos. 31663/65 and 33557/66. Heading A1F. In a black-currant harvester co-operating rotary feeders 16 receive, from a conveyer 13, fruit-bearing branches 14 with the heads leading, the branches being fed between pairs of rotatable plucking members 21, 29 carrying pivoted resilient-wire loops, each feeder (Fig. 3) comprises a horizontal spindle 17 having at opposite ends discs between which extend angularly-spaced rods 18 parallel to and equally spaced from the spindle, a fabric covering 19 fitting over the rods and extending inwardly between them to form a series of V-shaped troughs, the spindles of the two feeders being so spaced and driven in unison that as the feeders rotate a rod 18 on one feeder enters a pocket on the other. Beyond the plucking members a pair of toothed ejector-rollers 31 sieze the stripped branches and deposit them on a waste conveyer 32, the fruit being simultaneously deposited on a conveyer 34 together with leaves, which are winnowed away by an air-blast from a duct 36 as they fall towards a final-delivery conveyer 35 for discharge into trays 39. As shown, the machine is towed on wheels 11 to a fixed position where the front end of the vehicle is supported by an adjustable stand 12, but in a modification (Fig. 6, not shown), wherein the machine is mobile during use, the conveyer 13 is preceded by a cutter-bar at ground-level and is flanked by stands for operators who arrange the cut branches on the conveyer. The cutterbar is preceded by crop-dividers and by vertical drums with retractable tines which feed the cut bushes towards the conveyer. The cutter-bar is verticallyadjustable.