MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.

1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

AUTOMATED COCONUT CHOPPING MACHINE

AhilaRajan Jayasankar1*, Fedor Gubarev1, Sadasivan Theekay Veetil2, Samyak Samar2,
Ankit Kumar2
1
National Research Tomsk Polytechnic University, 634050, Tomsk, Russia
2
Manipal University Jaipur, VPO Dehmikalan, Jaipur, Rajasthan 303007, India

Abstract. The paper explains the purpose, working principle, advantages

and applications of the new machine named “Automated Coconut
Chopper”. The main purpose to design this machine is to automate an
activity of a farmer/labor i.e. chopping of green coconut in order to
consume water inside it and also designed considering the two main factors
safety and cost.

1 Introduction
In India, there are huge numbers of coconut tree cultivation and wide range of its
consumption, one of the major consumption is drinking the fluid inside the coconut.
Usually a labor is trained to cut the coconut. As the labor /farmers are disappearing
gradually, this machine helps to overcome or to substitute this action.
In India, coconut is cultivated mainly in the coastal tracts of Kerala, Tamil Nadu,
Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, West Bengal, Pondicherry, and Maharashtra and in the
islands of Lakshadweep, Andaman and Nicobar. By the late 1970s it accounted for some
68% of total production in India and at one stage some 899, 198 hectares were reportedly
under cultivation. Today Kerala produces roughly 45% of India's coconuts, with some 92%
of total production lying in the southern Indian states and Kerala's neighbors [1].
On the increased necessity of time and lack of skilled labor the field of automation and
automatic devices is developing in a wide range. To automate a day to day routine activity
or to easier an activity, we designed an automated machine “Automated coconut chopper”
the combination of various basic mechanical mechanism and only with the scrub materials.
The main purpose of this machine is to make “Green coconut” directly available for
consuming with reduced intermediate labors.
On the list of various catering machines like SIRMAN vegetable cutter, peeling
machine, grinders, roaster, cashew peeling machines from various manufactures we
designed a new machine which make the chopping of green coconut easier and also make it
economically feasible by all kind of man [2].

*
Corresponding author: [email protected]

© The Authors, published by EDP Sciences. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of
the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

2 Description of Mechanical system

The general principles of machine design are given in books [3–10]. According to the
purposes of projected device, we have suggested and made the following mechanical parts.
The overall schematic diagram is presented in Figure 1.
BASE PLATFORM is the base of entire system made of wood with the size of (5×4)
inches. All the components like conveyor, cutting stand mechanism, drilling mechanism, all
other motors and electrical components are all mounted on it. All the performance or
actions of the machine are held under this area or within the base platform.
COCONUT HOLDER is a device where the green coconut is placed and holds for the
entire process under taken by the machine. And it is suited on the conveyor system. The
overall mechanical view of the coconut holder is shown in the Figure 2, a. The base
structure is a rigid component of the entire mechanism, wood as a base material is
considered due to the load factor. And only this portion of the coconut holder is fastened to
the conveyor belt. Holding jaw is the only component is in direct contact with the green
coconut. There are two holding jaws in which one is rigid and other is movable. Material
considered for this element is wood strongly coated with rubber. Coated rubber helps in
strong grip. Rotating rod is fixed at the mid attaching to the base structure and movable
jaw. Rod is made of steel and externally threaded for certain region. The movable jaw is
assembled to this in order to perform translate action. The working principle or the
mechanism is plain screw vice mechanism. Basically all components are rigid except
movable jaw and connecting rod. The movable jaw moves to and fro on rotating the
connecting rod.
CONVEYOR is used to transfer the coconut to different task and return back to its
original position automatically. Flat belt conveyor is used. Power transmission from the
motor is done by chain drives. It is considered upon the factor heavy load obtained by the
objects and operations performed in the machine. Two chain drives are placed on both sides
of the conveyor and driven by a DC motor which is controlled by the controller. Belt
conveyor is a machine transporting material in a continuous way by friction drive. It is
mainly composed by rack, conveyor belt, belt roll, tensioning device and gearing. Belt
conveyor is composed by two endpoint pulleys and a closed conveyor belt. The pulley that
drives conveyor belt rotating is called drive pulley or transmission drum; the other one–
only used to change conveyor belt movement direction–is called bend pulley. Drive pulley
is driven by the motor through reducer, and conveyor belt dragging relies on the friction
drag between the drive pulley and the conveyor belt. The drive pulleys are generally
installed at the discharge end in order to increase traction and be easy to drag. Material is
fed on the feed-side and landed on the rotating conveyor belt, then rely on the conveyor belt
friction to be delivered to discharge end.

2
MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

Figure 1. Overall schematic diagram.

CUTTING MECHANISM is used in system for chopping the certain top layer of the
coconut. This element consists of rigid stand made of steel fastened to the base platform
rigidly holding the cutting motor with the support of holding plate rigidly. The holding
plate is adjustable to any height (depends upon the size of coconut).
CHAINDRIVES are common bicycle drives as the project was done by scrub.
DRILLING MECHANISM is used to give automatic feed to the drilling motor. The
drill mechanism is shown in Figure 2, b. It consists of base structure made of steel fixed to
the base platform rigidly to support the entire operation. Holding plate holds the drill motor
and it is assembled to the rotating rod in order to perform up and down movement. The
connecting rod is also steel and externally threaded to the certain portion where the holding
plate is assembled. The rotary motion of this element is done by chain drives which are
connected to the DC motor controlled by the conveyor. The working principle of this
mechanism is the connecting rod is rotated by motor connected with the chain drive and
due to this rotation the holding plates tends to move up and down. This leads as the
automatic feed of the drill motor.

a b c
Figure 2. Parts of the coconut chopping machine: a) coconut holder; b) drill mechanism; c) final
assembled machine.

3
MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

3 Description of Electrical system

The BRAIN of the automation system in this machine is the PLC controller (Siemens
S7-200 [11]) which controls all kinds of inputs and output accordingly. Depending on the
load of the conveyor system two DC motors are used as the project is done from the scrub
materials old wiper motors are used as CONVEYOR MOTORS and also the same kind of
motor is used as DRILL MECHANISM MOTOR in which the chain sprocket is assembled
on their shafts.
DRILL MOTOR is a small sized portable drilling machine (AC motor) which is
modified accordingly to assemble on the hanging plate of drilling mechanism. CUTTER
MOTOR is also the same motor of drill motor but replaced with the rotary cutting blades in
place of drilling spindle. SWITCHES, push buttons are used for start, stop, and reverse
switches which gives signal to the controller and also limit switch is also placed on the
conveyor system in order to perform certain actions according to controller. Relays are also
used to change the power supply to the actuators according to their requirements. Normally
single coil relay is used for all actions except the motor reversing operation and this
operation is done by double contactor relay which is more practically feasible to use.
The electrical connections are shown in Figure 3. The PLC controller is switched ON by
12 V DC supply on considering the types of inputs/outputs and the safety precautions. All
inputs (switches) are connected to the controller according to specifications. Before all
connection to the output relays are used according to the requirement. The main purpose on
using single contact relay on cutter and drill motor is to switch the Power supply as the
output from the controller is in DC and the motors are AC, Relay is required to switch the
supply to the motor. Reversing of conveyor motor and drill mechanism motor is required as
the machine needs the conveyor move to and fro and also the drill motor up and down.

Figure 3. Electrical connections.

This circuit uses a DPDT (Double Pole Double Throw) relay to switch which direction
the motor is turning. The motor is connected to both normally closed and normally open (in
reverse) sides of the relay. This in effect reverses the wiring whenever the relay is turned on
or off. The minimum voltage to drive this circuit is determined by the "pickup" voltage of
the relay. This is listed as 9.6 V – but we have found it to function properly on direct
connection with the controller.

4
MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

4 Software and operation

The algorithm of the entire machine is shown in the Figure 4. The algorithm and program is
designed according to the operations performed by the machine. The sequence of the
operation performed by the machine is explained below in details.
1. Coconut is fixed/assembled to the holder (manually).
2. Start button is pressed /Machine is started.
3. The cutter motor starts simultaneously the conveyor motor rotates in forward
resulting in forward movement of the conveyor.
4. Conveyor stops exact in front of drilling motor for drilling operation. This action is
performed as the limit switch switches ON upon the arrival of coconut holder.
5. Drill motor starts and the drill mechanism motor rotates forward resulting as the
automatic feed to the coconut. This operation is held for 10 seconds.
6. Now, drill mechanism motor is reversed in order to bring back the drilling motor to
its original position. This operation is timed to 13 seconds.
7. Conveyor motor rotates in reverse resulting in rotating conveyor in reverse direction
as the coconut holder is back to its original position and above action is timed to 16
seconds.
8. If the Emergency Stop button is ON all the actions are stopped suddenly and this
design is considered on safety precautions.
9. If the Reverse button is ON, the conveyor rotates in reverse resulting in reverse
movement of conveyor (used only after emergency stop).
According to the design and manufacturer of the PLC controller, the programming
software is used in which the commanding of PLC and various main performances are
done. The ladder diagram of the PLC program is shown in Figure 5. Ladder diagrams are
specialized schematics commonly used to document industrial control logic systems. Hence
used in this machine also.

Figure 4. Algorithm of the machine operation.

5
MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

Figure 5. PLC program.

4 Conclusion
The final assembled view of the machine is shown in the Figure 2, c. The total time
required to perform entire operation by this machine is around 60 seconds which is equal to
the time required for labor to perform this action. The time can be reduced if all
components are specially designed for this machine. As this machine is done only from the
scrub materials/components the machining time is high.
The challenging part while experimenting was the rotation of conveyor due to heavy
loads and balance of the belt also and this problem was cleared by having a supportive plate
under the belts. The other problem was feeding the drill motor automatically, lots of
wobbling was occurred and this problem was over came by adding additional supports to
the drill mechanism. And the other problem was conveyor stops while the cutting operation
takes place and this leads to damage of coconut also. This problem leads use to design

6
MATEC Web of Conferences 79, 01023 (2016) DOI: 10.1051/ matecconf/201679010 23
IME&T 2016

additional motors to the conveyor movements.

This machine costs around 300USD excluding the component PLC. As this method of
construction of machine was hit and trail this amount of money is used in many
experimental process. On considering from the manufacturer view the machine can be
manufactured for around 100USD including the controller where the PLC is replaced by
microcontrollers.
Now, there are no intermediate labors/farmers are required to perform this action and
also safety priorities are increased with this machine. Usually in India, only on the road
sides or outside the buildings the green coconut is available for consumption. But on
installing “Automatic money collecting system “with this machine helps to overcome the
above problem and this machine can be placed inside the corporate canteens also like
automatic coffee machines etc. Due to economic reasons the fixing of coconut is not
automated but it can be updated within the expense of 100USD.

References
[1] M.A. Oommen, Kerala economy since independence (Oxford & IBH Pub. Co., New
Delhi, 1979).
[2] Raw Cashew and Machinery. URL: http://www.cashewmachineryindia.in (2016)
[3] R.K. Singal, Mridual Singal, Rishi Singal, Basics of Mechanical Engineering (I.K.
International Publishing House Pvt. Limited, New Delhi, 2007)
[4] R.K. Rajput, A Textbook of Manufacturing Technology (Firewall Media, New Delhi,
2007)
[5] J.E. Shigley, C.R. Mischke, Standard Handbook of Machine Design (McGraw-Hill,
New York, 1986)
[6] T. Bartelt, Industrial Automated Systems: Instrumentation and Motion Control. 1st
Edition (Cram101 Textbook Reviews, 2011)
[7] L.A. Bryan, E.A. Bryan, Programmable controllers. Theory and implementation
(Industrial Text Company, 1997)
[8] A.J. Tripp, Basic electricity (Van Valkenburgh, Nooger & Neville, Inc., 1992)
[9] A.K. Gupta, S.K. Arora, Industrial Automation and Robotics (Laxmi Publications,
New Delhi, 2007)
[10] D.W. Pessen, Industrial Automation: Circuit Design and Components (John Wiley
& Sons, New York, 1989)
[11] SIMATIC S7-200. URL:
http://w3.siemens.com/mcms/programmable-logic-controller/en/simatic-s7-controlle
r/ s7-200/pages/default.aspx (2016)