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Predicting time consumption of chipping tasks in a willow short rotation coppice from GPS and acceleration data

Abstract:

Biomass procured from willow short rotation coppice has a promising potential to ensure the provision of clean energy. To evaluate and validate the effectiveness of different harvesting techniques and equipment for small-scale willow short rotation coppice applications, time and motion studies are usually implemented in small trials. Nevertheless, the results of such trials may be biased by the exclusion of the variability which could be generated by a long-term data collection approach; therefore, techniques and methods should be developed to sustain the implementation of longterm studies. This study tested the capability of GPS and acceleration data to accurately document chipping tasks in a small-scale willow short rotation coppice. Coupling location and acceleration data, followed by a thresholdsetting based on video recorded data and direct surveys in the field, led to the possibility to accurately separate the time spent in moving, chipping and non-chipping tasks. In addition, it was possible to observe, but not to extract, other events such as the transition time between the chipping and nonchipping states of the machine. The approach described in this study could be used to conduct long-term studies being suitable also for monitoring other harvesting equipment such as that chipping the stems during moving, as this could be enabled by a higher response in terms of acceleration induced by the vibration during chipping than by the movement itself.