Robot takes over the grape harvest

Christmas means friends, food and, for many, a few drinks. White wine is the most popular alcoholic beverage in the UK according to statics from luzerwine and Drinks International reports that we consume about £12 billion of alcohol in the four weeks leading up to Christmas. To keep supplying wine, especially with labour shortages in farming, winegrowers must increasingly rely on automation during the grape harvest.

But vineyards on slopes with a 75% gradient and narrow rows of vines were previously considered very difficult to automate. CH Engineering has developed a particularly compact harvesting vehicle precisely for this tricky application. It uses robust energy chains made of high-performance plastic from igus to work reliably even under difficult conditions and to minimise maintenance costs for winegrowers.

The harvester’s core is the UT110evo tracked vehicle. With a width of 1.32m, length of 3.2m and weight of 2.7 tonnes, it is light and small enough to be transported on a tractor trailer, allowing it to be used on vineyards with narrow access roads. On arrival, a side ramp on the trailer folds out, the vehicle drives down and into the vineyard row. A winch connects the vehicle to the trailer and supports it with a tractive force of 1.5 tonnes, which allows gradients of up to 75% to be climbed. In these steep locations, the operator can incline their seat to a position which reduces strain on the body.

Motion plastics reduce maintenance costs

A major achievement in the machine’s design is the development of a vehicle that copes with the harsh conditions of the vineyard while simultaneously minimising the machine’s maintenance.

The key to success: the best technical components. The engineers opted for energy chains made of high-performance plastic from igus, to guide the hydraulic and electrical cables from the vehicle to the harvesting head. The e-chains not only prevent the cables from kinking and jamming but also eliminate the risk of them getting caught in the vines.

"They also help increase the longevity of the machine," says Justin Leonard, Director of e-chains and cables at igus UK. "Our energy chains are made of durable, corrosion-free, UV-resistant high-performance plastic, meaning that they retain their mechanical properties for years without maintenance."
The engineers have also replaced classic metal bearings with igus polymer bearings. In the past, ball bearings were so badly corroded that they only lasted one season before needing replacement, despite daily lubrication. For this reason, plastic plain bearings from igus are now also being used. They are corrosion-free, robust and require no added lubrication, as solid lubricants already integrated in the material enable low-friction dry running.

Shaking vines

The other main component of the vehicle is the CH 500 steep slope harvester, an attachment that can be connected to the front-loading area of the tracked vehicle in 30 minutes using just six screws. Shaped like a giant nutcracker, it has two movable arms, connected to the upper part of the machine enclosing the vine. On the insides of these arms is a mechanism that vibrates the vine with up to 620 vibrations per minute that shake off the grapes.

A collection system under the machine collects the grapes and transports them to a collection container. The harvester moves down the vineyard at a speed of up to 2.8 miles per hour – significantly faster than any human harvester. On the way back, it can even reach speeds of up to 5.6 miles per hour, pulled by the winch. Back on the trailer, operators empty the container and position the vehicle for the next row of vines until the entire vineyard has been harvested.