A Simple Portable Cable Way for Agricultural Resource Collection

A significant problem for Indian farmers today is the difficulty of obtaining labor for farm operations. The most labor intensive operation is the post-harvest resource collection. A simple, economical, compact cable way system has been designed, developed and fabricated to haul sugarcane loads from the field. The cable way is made up of simple collapsible steel ‘A’ posts, which can be assembled on-site from ready-made frames. The sugarcane loads are slung on trolleys which move on a steel cable passing over the top of the frames, the cable being tightened with a chain pulley block. The trolleys are pulled along by a recirculating rope operated by a winch. The empty trolley is pulled along by the same rope along a cable way running near the bottom of the ‘A’ post. Several trolleys can move simultaneously along the cable way. With a 2 HP motor the trolley speed was noticed to be about 0.3 m/s and the overall performance of the prototype was satisfactory. The entire setup is fabricated from easy available and low cost components.