Power tiller: vibration magnitudes and intervention development for vibration reduction

The operators of power tiller are exposed to a high level of vibration originating from the dynamic interaction between the soil and the machine. The vibration from the power tiller is transmitted from the handle to hands, arms and shoulders. In the present study, experiments were conducted in three operational conditions i.e. transportation on farm roads, tilling with cultivator and rota-tilling with rota-vator. The highest vibration values were observed in x-direction in all the experiments. The maximum vibration rms values for x-direction were 5.96, 6.81 and 8.00 ms(-2) in tilling with cultivator, transportation and rota-tilling respectively. Three materials were used for intervention development to reduce vibration magnitude. The maximum reduction of 25.30, 31.21 and 30.45% in transportation; 23.50, 30.64 and 20.86% in tilling with cultivator and 24.03, 29.18 and 25.52% in rota-tilling were achieved with polyurethane (PU), rubber and combination of PU and rubber intervention. It was found that the maximum vibration reductions were achieved with the rubber in all three operational conditions. The average exposure time for occurrence of white finger syndrome increased by 28-50% with incorporation of intervention in different operations. Physiological and postural parameters also improved with incorporation of interventions.