New Holland North America, Inc.

Fiatgeotech-technologie Per La Terra

Carlo Sedoni

Garth Harvey Bulgrien

Enrico Sedoni

Alfredo Cevolini

Andrea Gonano

An engine delivers torque to a transmission drive shaft through a flywheel and a damper. The damper includes a drive plate attached to the flywheel which is in turn mounted on the engine crankshaft. The damper has two driven plates which are fixed on the transmission drive shaft. The drive plate and driven plates have openings for retaining springs through which torque is transmitted from the drive plate to the driven plates. The flywheel has a plurality of arcuate segments equally spaced apart around a peripheral edge to form a plurality of windows. One of the driven plates has a plurality of radially extending fingers each extending into one of the windows so that gaps exist between each finger and two adjacent arcuate segments. As torque is transmitted through the damper the springs are compressed and the fingers move in the windows. A single sensor senses the passage of the arcuate segments, gaps and fingers and generates an output signal which is analyzed by a microcomputer to produce indications of engine RPM and torque transmitted through the damper.

Measurement of rotational velocity and torque

The device is mounted in an agricultural machine comprising two links for drawing an implement, a lifter member and a central control unit for controlling the member. The device comprises: two horizontal bars carried in the form of brackets from the chassis of the machine; and four resistive elements deposited on flat faces of the bars symmetrically with respect to a neutral axis defined in this latter, made of a material having an electrical resistance proportional to the deformations to which they are subject and connected in a Wheatstone bridge circuit in such a way such that this arrangement generates an electrical signal proportional to the imbalance of the bridge caused by the deformations to which the elements are subjected, and which are transmitted from the traction force on the implement.

Growing community of inventors

Modena, Italy

Carlo Sedoni