Sowing Machine for Scallop Seedling in Bottom-culture

Abstract

The scallop is among the most important shellfish resource and is a proven candidate for aquaculture in many countries. In China, the scallop is generally bottom culture and artificial seeding. Artificial seeding on scallops is a difficult process with low production efficiency, high labor intensity, excessive cost low profit, and high rate of mortality and damage. In this paper, a sowing machine is developed for the bottom-sowing culture of the scallop. It consists of a transmission module, sows slide module, and buoyancy module. The structure and working mechanism of this machine are presented and analyzed in detail. The tests of experiments were conducted as well with the development machine. Through the simulation analysis of flow field of bottom-sown machine. The results show that the vortex area below the platform makes the scallop seedlings seedlings spread more evenly. In addition, the boat-shaped fairing at the head of the platform effectively reduces the water flow rate inside the platform, allowing the scallop seedlings to successfully leave the platform through the grille at the bottom of the platform after sowing. The control group efficiency is 26.67%; however, the optimized group efficiency average value is 57.97%. The cost of bottom sowing 1t scallop seedling was reduced from 1260 RMB to 124.4 RMB. It is proven that the design of the machine is feasible.