Scientific Journal of KubSAU

In the study of the processes of growing, harvesting, post-harvesting processing and delivery of fruit and vegetables it seems to be rational to have generalized control of the "product – environment – packaging – transport - storage" in general, as well as providing the possibility of creating optimal conditions for fruit and vegetable products depending on its condition. The basis of ensuring product integrity at all stages of production is a system approach with application of modern information technologies. Optimization of logistic processes in the agro-industrial complex (AIC), in addition to cost, market influences many important indicators of the final product of this complex: quality, timing and reliability of supply, the size of the delivered batches, etc. The quality of fruits and vegetables begins to change dramatically immediately after harvesting. Being in a stressful and unfavorable conditions, fruit, vegetables, root crops intensively lose moisture and consume nutrients, secrete aromatic substances, carry out the breathing process. These losses are caused by biological factors fit fruit and vegetable products to the changed conditions. Thus, the main indicators of the quality of products to control rationally in the process of harvesting and subsequent production phases take into account the data obtained to optimize process parameters to reduce losses and damage products. The article discusses the prospects of applying the system-information approach to the formation of quality of fruits and vegetables during transportation and storage. The proposed embodiment of a generalized control of the "product – environment – packaging – transport - storage", aimed at ensuring the possibility of creating optimal conditions for easy-to-sell agricultural products (fruits, vegetables, root crops) depending on its condition. We have established that rational technology of production and sales of products must have the ability to control and operational adjustments depending on the level of quality input products from the stage of harvest

Gardening is one of the high-value and highly profitable branches of agriculture. However, the level of fruit production in Russia still lags far behind the needs of the population: 20-25 kg of fruits and berries per year are grown per capita, which is a quarter of the minimum consumption rate. Currently, domestic gardening has a low efficiency due to non-compliance with the criteria of world production of fruits. The production of gardens is not competitive enough and does not meet the requirements of the highest quality categories of domestic standards. To increase fruit production, it is necessary to increase the level of intensification of fruit growing using the most valuable varieties and progressive technologies of cultivation. In this article, we consider devices for soil content in orchards, as well as for pruning trees - the main agrotechnical techniques in the technology of growing pomegranate crops that promote the production of stable, optimal harvests of fruit crops. The universal device of fruits is also covered, which makes it possible to reduce labor costs during the laying, care and harvesting of the fruit garden. The wide development of intensive technologies for growing fruits adapted to specific climatic conditions and ensuring a high level of competitiveness and profitability of production is one of the necessary conditions for the further development of gardening in Russia

The transportation process plays an important role in the delivery of agricultural products to the consumer. On how well the fruits are preserved, their grade will depend, and, consequently, the price of them. It is known, that the annual damage from losses of agricultural products in the agro-industrial complex amounts to 8 billion rubles, according to various estimates. A large number of different factors affect the safety of fruits during transportation: temperature, humidity, smoothness of the vehicle, type of container, etc. The more factors will have a negative impact on fruit and vegetable products, the more losses will ultimately be. The appearance of dents and abrasions on the fruits gives rise to the formation of foci of rot, leading to damage to the transported products, and, as a consequence, reducing the grade. In order to reduce the losses of fruit and vegetable products in the process of transportation, the USSR and the Russian Federation have been and are working on the creation of containers and ways of transporting pomegranates. All of them, according to the authors, are able to reduce the dynamic loads that arise during the transportation process and have a negative impact on the transported products. However, due to various circumstances in commercial gardening all these developments have not been extended

Condition monitoring is a necessary element of the transport and special machinery in agriculture. The task of the control operations other than the determination of the technical state of the object is to determine the required amount of work, as well as rational amount of collateral the repair of which could be combined with the next maintenance. Based on the results of processing of the information, we may generate requests for service. In the conditions of uncertainty of receipt of requests for servicing of individual machines, estimated volumes and timing, we have am appropriate development of applied technique of justification of the number of diagnostic posts for interactive control of a technical condition of vehicles and special machinery in agriculture. The presented methodology is based on probabilistic methods, and allows the quick optimization of the number of existing posts interactive diagnostics in the enterprise, if necessary, translating the existing posts in "standby" mode, or Vice versa, returning from a reserve in "work" mode. The production and technical base of the enterprise service based on the specific assumptions are considered as a system of mass service (SMO), and the function of such a SMO – as the process of mass service. The process of queuing as applied to interactive diagnosis are "Markov" processes "death and reproduction" with a finite or countable number of States and continuous time. To describe the states of the system we use the system of the Kolmogorov equations for steady state of "Markov" process. On their basis, we have determined average queue length, time of stay orders in the queue, number of busy channels and the bandwidth of the CFR. Using the intensity of the requests and the service time of a single application for specific equipment, the article establishes the efficiency of online diagnosis posts. The result of the proposed applied methodology enables timely decision-making about the need for reconstruction or technical re-equipment of the company

Potato has been and remains one of the five world's most important crops. For nearly two hundred years potato in Russia is the "second bread". This is one of the so-called social products. Over the past 20 - 25 years of potato farming in our country, there have been significant changes, both positive and negative. Today, potatoes are grown in different soil and climatic conditions in more than one hundred countries around the world, including the desert oasis and beyond the polar circle. Potato cultivation Center recently has moved to Asia. In our time, the leaders of potato production are China, Russia, India, the US and Ukraine. Over the past few decades the number of produced potatoes has increased by 41% and the area under potato planting only 9.5%. From the above data it is clear that the world potato economy in recent years has got significant changes, indicating that the timeliness and relevance of the material in this article is true

Due to the deterioration of the ecological situation in the world, population tends to eat organically grown foods that are grown either without or with minimal use of chemicals. The development of agriculture in this direction leads ultimately to organic agriculture. To improve the competitiveness of this direction, we need more effective agricultural machines, especially in the last phase of cultivation, namely at the stage of harvesting. One of the most difficult scientific and technical problems with the mechanical harvesting of potatoes is not letting vegetable impurities and tops to fall down in the hopper with the potato tubers, which among other things will improve operational efficiency technology. The article reviewed the various methods for removing the tops, as well as their advantages and disadvantages. The article makes a conclusion about the need for potato top separators in harvesting machines. We have also considered a promising device for removing haulm, a conveyor with flexible fingers on the bars and the clamping beater. Тhe most short-lived structural element of the device for removing haulm, reducing reliability of the device, is flexible fingers mounted on rods. We have proposed to use polyurethane as a material for manufacturing flexible fingers

The role of transport in agricultural production is significant. It is the connecting link in the technological chain of the agro-industrial complex (of the APC). On-farm transport in the APC together with cars and tractor transport are widely used. The rationality of the use of wheeled tractors for farm transport substantiates the possibility of their movement on asphalt and on dirt roads. The specific gravity of the tractor transport in the domestic agriculture is 22-27% of the total volume of transport and 50-60% of the volume of farm traffic. A high level of use of tractor transport has been observed in the countries of Western Europe and the USA. In the farms of leading countries of Western Europe (Germany, Italy, France, etc.) about 70- 90% on-farm transport of agricultural goods is done by tractor transport. Tractor transport in a live environment is running on roads with varying terrain, a wavy profile cover, on soils with different hardness and humidity. When driving vehicles at high speeds, the trailer is wobbling from side to side, constantly accompanying tractor transport during its operation. As a result, it is bad for propulsion, transmission, and it deteriorates the dynamic performance properties of equipment, working conditions of the operator. To reduce the amplitude of oscillations of the trailer, the operator is forced to work strenuously with the steering wheel or to slow down the speed, which in turn affects operator fatigue, as well as the performance and maneuverability of the vehicle. Thus, advanced technologies in electronics, sensor technology and software will determine the nature of agro-technical innovations and will lead to increased automation of business processes in crop production with the aim to organize the work more effectively, efficiently, accurately, environmentally friendly and economically feasible. When working with intelligent technologies, understanding the development of high-tech, precision engineering requires a revision to the personnel policy and education in agriculture, which should be based on the relevant organization of farms and their proper new type engineering solutions

In recent years, in many countries around the world, much attention is paid to the issues of ensuring of rational use of energy resources, due to a number of objective factors, chief among which are: the lack of own energy resources to meet domestic energy needs; the sharp increase in the cost of production and the production of energy resources; further growth in energy needs; the presence of large potential opportunities to reduce unproductive losses of fuel and energy. In the world, the challenge now is to ensure a gradual but steady transfer of the economy on energy saving way of development. To achieve the goal of reducing energy costs we might use two ways: firstly, the widespread introduction of energy saving technologies, and secondly, the reduction of material production, improving its quality and service. In agriculture, the improvement of the technological process can be carried out using new tillage methods, improving the organization of production and tools. Further development of mechanization in agriculture will contribute to further growth of electrification in the agricultural sector, which will significantly reduce the use of the most expensive and limited energy resources. The article offers a technique of the estimation of the efficiency of consumption of energy in agricultural production. In order to compare the efficiency of machines in the cultivation and harvesting of potatoes, there was conducted an energy assessment of the operations of modern technology. As variables, there were investigated different operation modes of the machine: working speed and working width, depth of stroke of the working bodies. In the process of evaluating energy operations, modern technology to prepare the soil for planting potatoes was determined humidity, mechanical composition and soil type. As a main factor in the analysis of technological methods, we have taken the overall specific energy consumption and specific energy consumption for the digging below tuber formation. Analysis of theoretical researches of agricultural machinery has led to the conclusion that the energy cost of implementing the technological process in the machines of different designs varies

In the world, recycling processes have recently become more common in order to save material and energy resources. Currently, in connection with the level of motorization, there grew a problem of recycling waste tires and their elements which is of great importance for many regions of the country. Decommissioning worn tires is a source of environmental pollution, bearing the prolonged character; they are not a subject to biological destruction and require constant increase of storage facilities. There is a continuous accumulation of used tires and we can recycle only about 20% of their amount. Worn tires represent very large-capacity products of polymer-containing waste, virtually resistant to natural degradation. Therefore, the problem of processing and secondary use, emerged from the operation of tires is of great economic and environmental significance. However, the worn tires are a source of valuable secondary raw materials: rubber, soot (essentially pure carbon), metal and synthetic cord. 90% of all waste of rubber are tires and represent a vast reserve of raw materials. In the emerging in the industry nonrenew- material resources the efficient use of secondary raw materials is of great importance. There are improved technologies for processing rubber goods, and the equipment used for it

While mechanical harvesting of potatoes, about 20-40% of the tubers get damages. Dynamic loads, injuries of the tubers, causing internal damage – which is browning of the flesh of the tuber, which occurs in the process of its storage. At the same time, ways to express control of damage to potato tubers will allow both reducing damage during harvest, and promptly sending damaged potatoes for recycling before the results of mechanical stress for the tubers during harvesting. The definition of internal damage to the potatoes is possible because of the analysis of the different elasticity of the tissues of damaged and undamaged tubers. The value of overpressure of the device is chosen such way that during deformation of tubers there mainly has been compression of the damaged tissues of the tuber, with the least turgor. The degree of damage of samples of tubers is determined by the ratio of the volume of damaged tissues of tubers to the total volume of the sample. We have given the mechanical properties of tissues of tubers, fruits and root vegetables, their structure, dimensional characteristics, it can be assumed that the use of this method of determining internal damage possible for apples, carrots, beets and harvest of other crops. Use of damage control will enable timely identification of hidden damage and make it possible to eliminate their causes, which lead to increase loss products