Modeling of technical, economic, environmental and ergonomic parameters of forestry machines in function of the quantity of days of the working scale

Abstract

Forest machine operators work on a long scale of work, which causes physical and psychological wear and consequently reduced productivity and increased fuel consumption. The objective of this research was to verify the influence of the number of days of the work schedule of harvester and forwarder operators in low-volume forest on technical, economic, environmental and ergonomic parameters. The research was performed in forest stands with an average wood volume of 0.10 m³ tree-1. In the first, second, third and fourth day of the work schedule, productivity, energy demand, production cost, carbon dioxide emission and the occurrence of fatigue in the operators were determined. The productivity values ??of harvester operators on the third and fourth days of the work schedule decreased by 2.62 and 7.74%, respectively, in relation to the average value of the first and second days. The productivity of forwarder operators was similar in the first three days of the work schedule, with a more marked reduction in the fourth day. The reduction in the number of days in the forest machine operators’ work schedule makes the operation more sustainable from a technical, economic, environmental and ergonomic point of view.