SUMMARY

Bangladesh is a country dependent on reliable rice production. In Bangladesh, many agricultural processes used during the production of rice are still done by hand. These processes, like planting and harvesting, are labor intensive. Over 90% of planting and harvesting are done by hand in Bangladesh. To reduce the labor required for these processes, mechanical agricultural equipment is increasingly being adopted by farmers. Critical to farmers’ ability to sustainably operate and maintain mechanical agricultural equipment is the timely availability of spare parts that are not cost prohibitive. Because of this, there is a strong desire to produce spare/replacement parts for agricultural equipment domestically. This thesis assists in the development of manufacturing processes for the production of a selection of spare parts for agricultural equipment in use in Bangladesh.

The spare parts include a combine harvester cutter bar blade, combine harvester threshing knife, and rice transplanter fork. These parts are wear items and require frequent replacement on the machines used for planting and harvesting of rice. This thesis provides a strategy for developing manufacturing processes for these parts. Bangladeshi engineering enterprises will be able manufacture the spare parts following the strategy provided.

The manufacturing strategy presented in this thesis includes the use of impression-die forging and bottoming bending to create some of the spare part features. Experimental testing of impression-die forging and bottoming bending processes are performed to validate computer simulations of the corresponding processes. Analytical and empirical calculations are also presented for the bending processes.