EDEM-based design and test of precision feeder for caged breeder ducks
A vane type pellet feeder was designed to solve the problems of inaccurate feeding quantity of the feeder system for current cage breeder ducks and the low degree of controlling individual feeding amounts during feeding process adverse to the breeding and selection of breeder ducks.A three factor and three level orthogonal experiment was established based on the experimental factors of feed passage pitch,blade spiral lift angle and blade speed,and the coefficient of variation of feed discharge per unit time of the feeder as evaluation indicators by analyzing the feeding and discharging principles of the feeder and the pa-rameters of its core working components.The order of influence and optimal combination of various factors based on actual breeding needs were analyzed.According to the results of simulation,the primary and sec-ondary order of the influence of each parameter on the uniformity of the discharge was the passing pitch of feed,spiral rising angle of discharge blade,and the speed of blade.When the pitch of feed passed through a spacing of 9.0 mm,the spiral rising angle of discharge blade was 71.5°,and the speed of blade was 58.4 r/min,the minimum discharge coefficient of variation of the feeder was 18.66%.The results of a bench test conducted to verify the discharge performance of the feeder under the optimal combination of parame-ters showed that the coefficient of variation of the feeder discharge was 18.74%,the discharge speed was 109.26 g/s,and the relative error between the preset amount of discharge and the actual amount of dis-charge was 3.07%,meeting the feeding needs of caged breeder ducks.