Loading patent…
AssigneeEcole Nationale Superieure d'Electricite et de Radioelectricite de Bordeaux (E.N.S.E.R.B.) U.E.R. Derogatoire de l'Universite de Bordeaux
InventorsGerard Bousseau, Pierre Baylou, Andre Mora, Michel Monsion, Christian Bouvet
Estimating the term…
An automatic asparagus picking machine is disclosed comprising a chassis able along a mound in which the asparagus are grown. The chassis has a picking tool which is mounted for horizontal and vertical translation at right angles to the direction of displacement of the chassis. The tops of the asparagus are back lit by a lighting system on one side of the mound and their images are picked up by a camera system on the other side. A microprocessor controls the direction of displacement of the chassis parallel to the mound and controls the horizontal and vertical translation of the picking tool. In one embodiment, there is one camera and the microprocessor has a window generator generating windows in two zones of the field of view of the camera. In another embodiment, juxtaposed wide angle and narrow angle cameras are used. Electric motors drive each of two front wheels at different speeds to control the direction of displacement of the machine.
An automatic asparagus picking machine comprising a movable chassis, means for displacing and controlling the direction of displacement of said chassis parallel to a mound of soil in which asparagus to be picked are grown, an asparagus picking tool, means mounting said asparagus picking tool for horizontal and vertical translation at right angles to the direction of displacement of said chassis, detection and control means for detecting asparagus to be picked and controlling the position of said picking tool, the improvement wherein said detection and control means comprises a camera system and a lighting system for back lighting the mound of soil, said camera and lighting systems being mounted on said chassis so as to be on opposite sides of the mound and arranged substantially in a horizontal plane adapted to coincide with the top of the mound, said means for displacing and controlling the displacement of said chassis including microprocessor means for controlling the direction of displacement of said chassis parallel to the mound, motor means for horizontal and vertical translation of said picking tool, said microprocessor means also controlling the horizontal and vertical translation of said picking tool for extracting a detected asparagus from the mound and transferring it to a receptacle.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.