The new knife sharpening unit on Pöttinger Jumbo and Jumbo combiline loader wagons enables the knives to be sharpened automatically at the loader wagon. This system considerably reduces time spent on maintenance while ensuring optimum chopping quality at all times, reduced energy consumption and increased performance.
Current solutions require the knives to be removed from the loader wagon and sharpened in the workshop. The grinding machines normally in use range from angle grinders to stationary grinding machines or semi-automatic grinders. Usually, knives are changed just once, at the end of a working day. When subjected to intensive operation such as 10-20 hours/day, the sharpness of the knives inevitably tails off during the day. As a consequence the power requirement increases by up to 15%, or even 20% on stony ground. Diesel consumption increases in direct proportion.
Automating the grinding process on the Pöttinger loader wagon brings numerous advantages: permanently sharp knives are in operation resulting in approximately 10% lower power requirement and lower fuel consumption as a result, in addition to greatly reducing time spent on maintenance. Sharpening can take place during a break and the driver does not need to clean and grind the knives after a long working day. The Pöttinger system provides a considerable gain in comfort as well as ensuring maximum cost-effectiveness.
The knife bank pivots out of the loader wagon automatically and the driver starts the grinding process by pressing a button on the loader wagon control panel inside the tractor cab. The knife bank spacers pivot out of the grinding mechanism path and the grinding mechanism pivots from the parked position into the operating position by pressure control sequence. After the sensors have detected that the mechanism is in the working position the grinding process starts on the left hand side of the first knife. The back-and-forth motion of the grinding disc along the knife blade is controlled using a defined pressure. The cross-travel carriage changes position to find the next knife. After the grinding process has been completed, the grinding mechanism, the spacers and then the whole knife bank are pivoted back again. The number of grinding sequences and the grinding of individual knife groups can be set individually. The grinding process for 45 knives takes about four minutes.
For more information visit: www.poettinger.at.
