AbstractŠpokas L., Adamčuk V., Bulgakov V., Nozdrovický L. (2016): The experimental research of combine harvesters. Res. Agr. Eng., 62: 106-112.The paper presents results of the experimental research of a middle-size combine harvester when used for harvest of winter wheat and spring barley in heavy harvest conditions. Based on the results obtained, it was possible to determine the effect of field conditions on the crop mass flow in combine harvester, grain losses, fuel consumption, and combine harvester field performance. It was found that grain moisture content and conditions of the crop stand have a significant effect on the work indicators of the combine harvester when compared with its technological parameters and crop mass flow.Кeywords: grain losses; fuel consumption; combine harvester field performance As stated by Kutzbach and Quick (1999) the main processes in a modern harvester are gathering and cutting, threshing, separating, cleaning, and material handling. Currently, designers of the combine harvesters pay more attention to the improvement of the quality of control process, its automatic control, improve the trafficability of the chassis and the environment protection. They argue that an increase in engine power increases the throughput of the combine harvester. Engine power of the combine harvesters equipped with the classic straw walkers already exceeded 295k W/400 HP, and hybrid and axial -closer to 440 kW/600 HP (Srivastava et al. 2006). But the throughput of the combine harvester is associated not only with the power of the engine, and it is more closely connected with the separation deck area, straw walker and cleaning mechanism capacity.According to the FAO Report (FAO 2014) in Ukraine, the 2014 aggregate cereal production is estimated at about 61.9 million tonnes marginally below 2013 year's record level and around 25% above the five-year average. This output reflects near-record yields, following favourable weather conditions during the cropping season, which more than offset a slight contraction in the planted area compared to 106

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Wide span tractors/vehicles have good prospects as the mechanisation means for controlled traffic farming. The efficiency of the practical application of wide span tractors (vehicles) depends on the availability of the substantiated scientific basis or the theoretical basis for the research into their key properties, including among other factors the smoothness of movement. The aim of the research is to improve the smoothness of movement of wide span tractors (vehicles) by substantiating their configuration, design-and-process and other parameters as well as the properties of the longitudinal profile of the agricultural background irregularities in the ruts of the laid-down process track. The smoothness of movement of the wide span tractor (vehicle) as a dynamic system travelling in the ruts of the permanent process track substantially depends on the structure of the latter's longitudinal profile, the stiffness of tyres on the supporting wheels, while the dynamics of the vertical oscillations of the process section depends on its operating weight.

he paper presents an analysis of the basic principles of formation, the properties and characteristics of a new modular energy tool, consisting of the energy and the technology modules. The purpose of this study is to assess the degree of impact of the throttle in the hydraulic line, connecting the cavity of the hydraulic cylinder, upon the controllability of the modular power tool with a mounted plough during the movement of the ploughing aggregate on the headland. As a result of the conducted tests, it was proved that increasing the controllability of the movement of the aggregate on the basis of a mobile power tool is possible by throttling one of the hydraulic cylinders that limit the mutual reciprocal rotation of the modules in a horizontal plane. Installation of the throttle modular power tool on the limiting hydraulic cylinder with a drag coefficient 1.03×106∙N∙m∙s∙rad–1 allows one to reduce two times the delay in the reaction of the relative bearing of the energy module to a change in the angle of rotation of its driven wheels.

The harvest and transport of sugar beet leaves during harvesting can be considered a current task in the area of sugar beet growing system development. A rotary sugar beet leaf cutting mechanism is used for achieving the significant increase in the harvester forward speed during harvest. This leads to intensive vibrations of the topping mechanism in the longitudinal vertical plane causing the decrease of harvest quality. Therefore, it is necessary to analytically determine the effect of kinematic and design parameters of the sugar beet topping mechanism front-mounted on the tractor and to discover the value of the amplitude of oscillations in the longitudinal vertical plane of its sugar beet topping mechanism. We have constructed a mathematical model of the estimated motion of this machine by means of dynamics equations in Lagrange II-kind form. A system consisting of two non-linear differential equations was obtained by developing the equivalent scheme of selected generalized coordinates and by performing the necessary mathematical transformations. This system describes the vibrations of the sugar beet topping mechanism in the longitudinal vertical plane. The optimal design and kinematic parameters of the sugar beet topper mechanism front-mounted on the tractor were determined by means of our own software and numerical solution of the differential equation system, which allows the reduction of mentioned vibrations.