Deere + Company

Carnegie Mellon University

William D Todd

Noel Wayne Anderson

Gurmukh H Advani

Bhanu Kiran Palla

Nathan R Vandike

Herman Herman

Niels Dybro

Stephen R Corban

Wentao W Yu

Scott Miller

Zachary Pezzementi

Volker Fuchs

Brian J Booth

Trenton Tabor

Jonathan Chang

Andrew C Locken

Systems and methods are described for a virtual sensor that determines an amount of grain loss during operation of a combine harvester without any direct measurement of grain loss. An electronic controller is configured to determine values for a set of operating conditions including a plurality of sensor values and actuator settings. The electronic controller then applies an artificial neural network that is configure to receive as inputs the values for the set of operating conditions and to produce as an output a value indicative of an estimate amount of grain loss.

Virtual sensor for grain loss in combine harvester

A grain tailings elevator for a combine harvester includes a an elevator housing having an interior containing a conveyor arrangement configured to transport grain tailings through the elevator housing to a discharge outlet. The elevator housing has a side wall with a window to the interior of the elevator housing. A camera having a camera housing containing an image sensor is mounted to the side wall of the elevator housing over the window with the image sensor in registration with the window. The image sensor is trained on the conveyor arrangement and configured to image the grain tailings transported by the conveyor arrangement through the elevator housing.

Grain quality control system and method

An agricultural permittivity sensor has a drive electrode and a separate sense electrode. Both electrodes have surfaces that face the sensed material and the surfaces are co-planar. The drive electrode receives an excitation signal and generates an electric field that produces a current in the sense electrode. The current is indicative of a test weight of the sensed material.

Agricultural moisture and test weight sensor with co-planar electrodes

Transmit patches lie on the outer set of conductive patches that are coupled to the transmitter via the signal splitter. The receive patches lie on the outer set of conductive patches that are coupled to one or more receivers to receive a radio frequency field (e.g., fringing field) associated with the transmitted signal of one or more adjacent corresponding transmit patches. A detector is associated with one or more respective receivers for determining or estimating an attenuation of the radio frequency field (e.g., fringing field). An electronic data processor is arranged for evaluating the estimated attenuation to estimate the grain loss content and material other than grain content of the agricultural material.

Radio frequency measurement device for measuring grain loss

Transmit patches lie on the outer set of conductive patches that are coupled to the transmitter via the signal splitter. The receive patches lie on the outer set of conductive patches that are coupled to one or more receivers to receive a radio frequency field (e.g., fringing field) associated with the transmitted signal of one or more adjacent corresponding transmit patches. A detector is associated with one or more respective receivers for determining or estimating an attenuation of the radio frequency field (e.g., fringing field). An electronic data processor is arranged for evaluating the estimated attenuation to estimate the amount, volume, mass or flow (e.g., yield) of harvested agricultural material and/or other than grain content of the agricultural material.

Radio frequency measurement device for measuring harvested agricultural material

A harvester may include a grain processing unit and a material flow sensor to form an yes electromagnetic plane or field through which crop material passes while being sensed.

Harvester with electromagnetic plane crop material flow sensor

A harvesting head yield monitor comprises two sensing elements () respectively disposed in two adjacent row unit covers (). A driver circuit () drives one of these sensing elements () to produce a high radio frequency signal. The other sensing element () receives the signal. A signal conditioning circuit () receives the signal from the other sensing element. A controller () coupled to the signal conditioning circuit converts the received signal into a signal that indicates the crop yield of the row unit that is disposed underneath the two adjacent row unit covers.

Growing community of inventors

Bettendorf, IA, United States of America

William D Todd