Separador de espiral rotativo no beneficiamento de sementes de soja

Abstract

The present work aimed to evaluate the rotary spiral separator by identifying the appropriate regulation in order to minimize the discarding of quality soybean seeds; determine the efficiency regarding the removal of less dense seeds and establish the influence of the passage of soybean seeds in the rotary spiral separator on physical and physiological quality. The rotary spiral separator equipment analyzed was installed in the seed analysis laboratory of the Petrovina Sementes company, composed of a spiral with a static capacity of one ton per hour. A batch of soybean seeds of 1200kg was used, without classification, the experiment was composed of 27 experimental units, each with 30kg, with the treatments consisting of two factors: rotation speeds (zero, 5 and 10rpm) and feed flow (openings of diameter 32.0; 38.5 and 47.6 mm, corresponding to 0.3; 0.6 and 1.2t/h) and three repetitions. The quantity (30kg) of seeds from each treatment repetition was placed in the feeding tank and the fractions discharged at the exit of the utilization fraction and the discard fraction were collected, weighed and subsequently the performance of the equipment was determined, and expressed in percentage, from each fraction a sample of 1kg was taken for the analysis of physical and physiological quality evaluation. The experimental procedure was in randomized blocks, in factorial 3x3 (rotation speed x feed flow). It was concluded that for the performance of the equipment, the highest seed discards were obtained at zero rotation speed, in the three feed flows. There was a better utilization of soybean seeds using the highest rotation speed, however, with regard to physical and physiological quality, these fractions may present mixtures with seeds of lower quality. The results of the physiological quality tests of the seeds for the utilization fraction remained high for the germination and vigor values, both for the rotation speed and for the feed flows. The rotation speed of 10rpm and the feed flows of 0.3 and 0.6t/h had a better performance, since there was a lower discard of quality seeds.