Grain Aeration Technique For Small Scale Formers

Abstract

In this work, a control strategy for grain aeration system was proposed. Aeration is the
process of forced movement of ambient temperature controlled air through a grain bulk,
which will help to preserve or improve the physical conditions of the stored grain. This
strategy was implemented using a microcontroller by relating a relative physical condition
like temperature and humidity. The objectives of grain aeration are to maintain the
temperatures inside the storage area, whenever the conditions inside the chamber deviate
from the predefined value, to prevent the storage grain from contamination. This method was
supposed to preserve grain over a long time without use of chemical agents or harmful
substance. It has been receiving more attention among the local population as the small scale
farmers where more benefited as it is cost efficient and also requires less maintenance
compared to that of costly coolant chamber method. The results showed that the proposed
strategy is efficient to achieve these objectives.