The invention relates to a conditioning device for a self-propelled agricultural harvesting machine, configured with functional elements including rollers and which operates with high output while preventing crop from escaping and which provides reliable and user-friendly access to the functional elements for purposes of maintenance and repair.
Conditioning devices are used in agricultural harvesting technology, particularly on self-propelled forage harvesters, to open up grains contained in the crop that was picked up, to improve digestibility when subsequently fed to animals. In the case of self-propelled forage harvesters, such conditioning devices are installed downstream of a chopping assembly relative to the direction of crop flow. Crop that has already been chopped enters the conditioning device where it is processed and then, with support from a downstream discharge accelerator, is discharged by way of a transfer device into a loading container.
To perform the above-mentioned function of opening up grains contained in the crop, current conditioning devices comprise two rollers that have a profile that is suitable for processing crop. Each of the rollers is supported with respect to a housing of the conditioning device in such a way that the rollers can rotate about their longitudinal axes and are driven by a belt drive provided at the harvesting machine. Due to their placement in parallel and with defined separation, the rollers delimit a gap through which the crop to be processed passes in the direction of crop flow and is thereby processed between the profiled rollers. Advantageously, the rollers rotate in opposite directions but at slightly different rates of rotation in order to increase the frictional effect.
Due to an increasing demand for harvesting machine output, the conditioning devices thereof must also be capable of processing a continually increasing throughput of crop. This requires components, in particular such as rollers, bearings, housing, drive, etc., which have increasingly greater dimensions. At the same time, it should be ensured that operation and control are reliable and maintenance-friendly. For purposes of maintenance and repair, it is always necessary to maintain easy access to the rollers, which are subject to considerable wear, and the shafts and bearings thereof. However, the functional components must remain closed to the outside during the harvesting operation to ensure that crop particles or juices that emerge from the crop during processing are retained inside.
In a conditioning device known from the prior art, according to U.S. Pat. No. 7,681,384 B2, access to the rollers for purposes of maintenance and repair is created by designing the housing of the conditioning device as two pieces. In the housing, a first roller is supported at a first frame part and a second roller is supported at a second frame part, and the two frame parts can be swivelled opposite one another from a closed position into an opened position, and ensures easy access to each of the two rollers in the opened position. In particular, the rollers can be removed from the housing in the radial direction in the closed housing position.
The disadvantage of the design is that it is very difficult for an operator to swivel the particular frame part that is at the top when installed in a harvesting machine, due to the heavy weight of rollers that are used today. A great deal of force and dexterity is therefore required to disassemble the rollers in the narrow maintenance space of a forage harvester. As such, the risk of injury is not inconsiderable since it is possible that the upper frame part will drop downward in an uncontrolled manner.