Workability Assessment of Different Stony Soils by Soil–Planter Interface Noise and Acceleration Measurement

Abstract

Sowing is critical for successful crop establishment and productivity, particularly in precision agriculture management strategies. However, topsoil characteristics directly affect agribusiness maximization (i.e., crop-yield increase, machinery efficiency, operating-cost reduction) even in the most advanced farming management techniques. The excessive presence of coarse fractions or stones in arable soil layers prevents modern machinery from reaching optimal efficiency. This work focuses on sowing to verify whether the vibration and noise arising during this operation significantly change with varying soil conditions according to the stoniness degree of disturbance on soil workability. To make this assessment, an experimental sowing activity was carried out on four soil plots with two different disturbance degrees. The results confirmed that the noise and acceleration of the sowing machine significantly correlated with the soil disturbance degree and related workability profile.