Design, Fabrication and Performace Evaluation of Mechanized Paddy Gatherer

Abstract

This study aimed to design, fabricate, and evaluate a mechanized paddy gatherer to lessen the labor cost and time spent in gathering the paddy. Performance evaluation of the machine was based on its capacity (cavan/hr), efficiency (%), economic feasibility and its comparison with the manual or traditional use of paddy gathering.

Evaluation was done in three (3) trials at 50 cavans per trial. Fuel consumption and number of cavan per man-hour was recorded. Results revealed that the machine has a capacity of 110 cavans/hour, far much higher than the traditional or manual use of paddy gathering with 52 cavans/hour. In terms of efficiency, the paddy gatherer has an efficiency comparable to the traditional use with 97.71% and 97.98%, respectively. Its operation cost is only PhP1.18/cavan that includes the labor cost, fuel and lubricants, depreciation charge, repair and maintenance while the cost of operation in traditional way is PhP 3.00/cavan which only includes labor
cost.

The cost of machine is approximately PhP 27,598.00 for labor, materials and engine. The computed return of investment (ROI) is 81.55% and payback period is 13.2 months.