Materials Today: Proceedings 39 (2021) 354–358

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Materials Today: Proceedings

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Design and fabrication of smart seed sowing robot

Pankaj Kumar ⇑, G. Ashok
Centre for Materials and Manufacturing, Department of Mechanical Engineering, S R Engineering College, Ananthasagar, Warangal 506371, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In agriculture, there is a need for a technology that is more easily understood, implemented and used by
Received 25 April 2020 the farmers. Equipment that requires less human effort and time with less cost of implementation is
Received in revised form 11 July 2020 much required for success in the agricultural industry. Seed sowing robot is a device that helps in the
Accepted 19 July 2020
sowing of seeds in the desired position hence assisting the farmers in saving time and money. Seed sow-
Available online 5 August 2020
ing is one of the main processes of farming activities. It requires a substantial amount of human efforts
and also time-consuming. This project aims to design and fabrication of the smart seed sowing robot for
Keywords:
the mentioned task. This smart seed sowing robot consists of one robotic arm to sow the seeds from the
Robots
Automation
seeds container. The robot arm is controlled through the mobile application to get the desired positions of
Agriculture the arm. Once all the positions are set, the arm sows the seed automatically after the switching button
Mobile application ON. The wheel of the robot also controlled through the mobile application. Thus, this system completely
Sowing machine automates the seed sowing process using a smartly designed mechanical system. This robot reduces the
efforts and the total cost of sowing as the seeds.
Ó 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0) Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of ICAMMM 2020.

1. Introduction cost of working and also for reduction of time of digging for sowing
the seeds. In addition, that article also presents the development of
Nowadays, demand for farming equipment which requires less a mobile application for controlling the motion of the developed
human efforts and time are increasing day by day. In addition, due agribots [6,7]. Bute, P. V. et al. [8] presented design, development,
to the development of internet of things (IoT) and robotics farming fabrication, and automation of seed sowing machines. The author
equipment has also become smarter. Pundkar [1] developed a high concluded that the developed agribot is capable of performing
precision pneumatic planters of many verities of crops, for a wide automatic digging and seed showing. Whereas, [9] carried out
range of seed sizes which result in uniform distribution of seeds the design and development of low-cost portable seed showing
alongside the travel path. Whereas Naik, N. S. et al. [2] fabricated machine. This article incorporated multiple cropping, broadcasting,
prototype of an autonomous agriculture robot which is specifically seed planter machine, Dibbling, Seed meter mechanism in the
designed for seed sowing task and concluded that this agribot is developed machine. However, [10] presented design and prototyp-
capable of seed sowing at optimal depth and at optimal distances ing of a robotic vehicle with seed selector and concluded that the
between crops and their rows. P.P. Shelke [3] investigated the robot is also designed in such a way that it will not only be used
application of bullock cart drawn planters for seed sowing in the for the seed sowing process of maize crops but will also be used
field. The author also presented the gap distance of the planting for some other crops like Bean, Cotton, and Grain.
plant population which severely affects the optimal production This article aims to present the design, development, and fabri-
of the crop. Ramesh, B. et al. [4] develop automated crop farming cation of smart robots which significantly reduces the human
equipment for multiple farming activities such as plowing, seed efforts and time of seed sowing activities by the farmers. Addition-
sowing, spraying pesticides, monitoring of soil and plants. Umar- ally, this smart robot also reduces dependency on human resources
kar, S., and Karwankar, A. [5] develop an agribot for reduction of in the agricultural sector and the wastage of seeds. The designed
and fabricated robots are controlled by the IoT system. The work-
ing principle is based on the motion of the stepper motors, dc
⇑ Corresponding author. motors, interfacing with the ultrasonic sensor, and a linear actua-
E-mail address: pankaj_kumar@srecwarangal.ac.in (P. Kumar).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2020.07.432
2214-7853/Ó 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0) Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the
scientific committee of ICAMMM 2020.
 P. Kumar, G. Ashok / Materials Today: Proceedings 39 (2021) 354–358 355

Fig. 1. (a)-(e) Three dimensional CAD model of the different components of Smart seed sowing robot and actual 3D printed robot (a) Top view of the smart robot (b) Isometric
view of the smart robot, (c) Front view of the smart robot, (d) Side view of the smart robot, (e) and (f) Testing of the fabricated robot in the field.

tor which is used for opening and closing of the valve required for in Table 1. The mechanical properties of the 3D printed compo-
the dispersion of seeds among other examples. nents are presented in Table 2.

2. Materials and method 3. Functions of different components

2.1. Design and modeling various components using a CAD package 3.1. Design Calculations

Initially, various dimensions of the smart seed sowing robot Calculations of the distance between two plants
are assumed based on the different dimensional constraints of The gear ratio of the stepper motor shaft and wheel is maintained
the robots. After considering various design aspects of the robot, 1 so that the gear can withstand a greater torque, minimizing errors.
then different parts of the seed sowing robot are designed using the gear ratio of 1:1 means that the engine and the transmission’s
CAD package PTC CREO 3.0.1. The appearance of the fabricated
smart seed sowing machine was given utmost importance for
more convincing and attractive. Various geometrical models of
the fabricated smart seed sowing machine are listed in Fig. 1
a-e.
The design of this smart seed sowing robot is based on the dif-
ferent modules which include sensing device, actuator, seed han-
dling unit, microprocessor, stepper motors, servomotors,
communication, and data processing unit. The block diagram of
the various components of the robot is presented in Fig. 2. The
circuit diagram of the main control unit is presented in Fig. 3
and the mobile interface is presented in Fig. 4. The specific at
automatic way of ion of the smart seed sowing robot is presented Fig. 2. Block diagram of the smart seed sowing robot.
356 P. Kumar, G. Ashok / Materials Today: Proceedings 39 (2021) 354–358

Fig. 3. Circuit diagram of the main control unit.

Fig. 4. Mobile application interface.

output rotate at the same speed. Therefore, one revolution of the all- D ¼ 2 p R ð1Þ
wheel will rotate half the revolution to the robotic arm.
D = 2 * p * 55
The distance traveled by the rear wheel is represented by D.
D = 345.4 mm (approx.)
Given, the radius of the rear wheel (R) = 55 mm
 P. Kumar, G. Ashok / Materials Today: Proceedings 39 (2021) 354–358 357

Table 1 3.3. Lane tracker and follower

Specifications of the smart seed sowing robot.

Component Specifications / Dimensions Seed sowing in the particular hole and moving towards another
Dimensions Length-320 mm, Width-250 mm, Height- hole is based on the line follower robots. In this study, this smart
400 mm, Wheelbase-55 mm, Ground robot follows the lane of the different rows and columns of the
clearance 110 mm. field. For this purpose, two ultrasonic sensors were integrated on
Stepper Motor Step angle- 1.8° full step 0.9° half-step, both sides of the smart robots. The stepper motor driver controls
Voltage & Current 12 V at 400 mA,
Holding Torque 2000 g-cm, Detent
the motion of the robot according to the signal received from the
Torque- 220 g-cm max, Weight- 0.24 kg controller.
(0.5 lbs.), Max continuous power- 5 W,
Shaft diameter- 0.197 in. (5 mm), Motor
height 1.5 in. 3.4. Obstacle avoidance process
Wheel configuration Front 2, Rear  2
Turning Radius 0.5 m To avoid the collision of the robot from the unwanted obstacle,
Turning angle 3600 ultrasonic sensors are used which is the prime need of any mobile
Power transmission Stepper and servo motor drive
Hopper limit 2 kg of medium size seeds
robot. The ultrasonic sensor sends the signal to the objects falling
on the way of the robot while sowing seed in the field, the sensor
will record the distance between the obstacle and the robot. Con-
sequently, the controller will stop the movement of the robot for
further seed sowing.

Table 2
Mechanical properties 3D printed components. 4. Result and discussion
Mechanical Properties Values
After taking the complete testing with various types of seed, the
Modulus of Elasticity 2.7 GPa
Density 1.3 g/cm3
yielding rate of seed sowing was higher as compared to the con-
Tensile Stress at Maximum Load 50 MPa ventional seed sowing machine. During, testing of the robot, differ-
Impact Strength 14.2183 KJ/m2 ent types of seeds have been sowed in a proper sequence according
Flexural Strength 158 MPa to different rows and columns marked in the field which results in
proper germination of seeds. The rate of seed sowing with different
types of seed is mentioned in Table 3.
Figure 5 shows the rate of seeding for different types of seed in
From this, clearly, the distance between two successive dis-
the field during the primary testing of the robot. It is concluded
tances of seed sowing is large. In order to maintain the required
that the sowing of the sesame takes the highest time as compared
gap distance, the robot arm will move back and forth.
to other types of the seed mentioned in Table 3. This is due to the
difficulty in gripping the sesame seed owing to the shape and size
3.2. Single seed discharger
of the sesame seeds.

In this, the release of the single seed from the hooper to hole
made in the ground is done by the single seed discharger unit. This 5. Conclusion
unit is connected with an air suction connection and is attached to
low pressure generator that is held up to a grain discharger, where All the components of this smart seed sowing robot are
dropping sequence from grain to grain is controlled by an electric designed and fabricated in the house with the aim to have
motor, and the deposition distance from grain to grain is con- hands-on training of fabrication of various components using 3D
trolled. This unit picks a single seed from the bulk seed coming printing technology and the use of IoT components. All the compo-
down and places it in the desired place of the hole in the soil to nents were designed using CAD software PTC Creo 3.0. In addition,
avoid the congestion of the crop after development. This action is this project also aimed at the automatic way of seed sowing in the
calibrated with the movement of the robot so that each hole will field. The seeds have been sowed in a proper sequence according to
be sown by the single seed at the required sowing speed. The opti- different rows and columns marked in the field which results in
mal sowing speed can be maintained in calibration with hole dis- proper germination of seeds. This smart and automated sowing
tance, speed robot, and selection of the single seed from the of seeds using a robot reduces the labor requirement and also
hopper. reduces human ergonomics.

Table 3
Test results of seed sowing.

Sl. No. Types of Seed Problems if any Solution Seedling rate

1 Ground Nut Drop without any problem Start servo motor to open-end 10 sec/ 2ft
2 Corn Seed Too many seeds drop at a time Setting the servo angle to a smaller value 8 sec/2ft
3 Red Gram Dal Difficult to pick the seeds Decrease the Wrist fingers distance 15 sec/2ft
4 Sesame Difficult to pick the seedsMoreover, Drop the Seeds Change the wrist finger shape 36 sec/2ft
5 Almond Difficult to pick the seeds Increase the Wrist fingers distance 26 sec/2ft
6 Soya bean Drop without Any Problem Start servo 26 sec/2ft
358 P. Kumar, G. Ashok / Materials Today: Proceedings 39 (2021) 354–358

CRediT authorship contribution statement References

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