Numerical simulation for deformation characteristic of tea shoot under negative pressure guidance by the immersed boundary–lattice Boltzmann method

Abstract

At present, due to the shortage of tea picking labour force, realizing the mechanized picking of famous tea is urgent. Using negative pressure guidance is a feasible method, which can compensate the localization error of machine vision. In this paper, tea shoot with one bud and two leaves is taken as the study object, and a ‘Y-type’ tea physical model is established according to its physical properties. Moreover, the deformation characteristic of tea shoot under negative pressure guidance is studied by using the immersed boundary–lattice Boltzmann method. The purpose is to analyse the effects of pressure P inside the pipe, vertical deviation H and horizontal deviation W on the deformation characteristics of tea shoot quantitatively. The effectiveness of the numerical calculation method is verified by the negative pressure guiding test. The results show that the success rate of negative pressure guidance is 100% when the leaf span d ≤ 30 mm and the horizontal deviation W ≤ 10 mm. The useful data and insights into the picking technology of famous tea based on negative pressure guidance are provided in this paper according to the findings mentioned above.