Multi-Operation Robot For Fruit Production

It is said that robot can be used for multi-purpose use by changing end effector or/and visual sensor with its software. In this study, it was investigated what multi-purpose robot for fruit-production was using a tomato harvesting robot and a robot to work in vineyard. Tomato harvesting robot consisted of manipulator, end-effector, visual sensor and traveling device. Plant training system of larger size tomato is similar with that of cherry-tomato. Two end-effectors were prepared for larger size tomato and cherry-tomato fruit harvesting operations, while the res components were not changed for the different work objects. A color TV camera could be used for the both work objects, however fruit detecting algorithm and extracted features from image should be changed. As for the grape-robot , several end-effector for harvesting , berry thinning , bagging and spraying were developed and experimented after attaching each end-effector to manipulator end. The manipulator was a polar coordinate type and had five degrees of freedom so that it could have enough working space for the operations. It was observed that visual sensor was necessary for harvesting, bagging and berry-thinning operations and that spraying operation requires another sensor for keeping certain distance between trellis and end-effector. From the experimental results, it was considered that multi-operations by the same robot could be appropriately done on the same or similar plant training system changing some robot components . One of the important results on having function of multi-operation was to be able to make working period of the robot longer.