Automatic cubicle bedding solutions?

[TomBowers]

Hi all,
Just putting a feeler out there as to what the industy's thoughts would be towards autonomous bedding machines. As a masters student at Harper Adams University I plan to design and build a bedding machine which sweeps and dispenses bedding all by itself, navigating itself through the shed and dropping the sweeping arm and dispensing light bedding (e.g. sawdust) as it goes, it could even start itself if set on a timer.
As a dairy farmer's son I think this will have several advantages by reducing labour and increasing the cleanliness of the beds, but it would bee interesting to hear what people have to say as to where it might fall down, or if it would work quite effectively.
Some gantry-type bedding machines exist where it drops material from above the cubicles but my idea is more like designing the autonomous side of things for the machine in the picture below, so the main advantage being just cutting out a man at the most busy time of day when cows are getting milked and all the shed jobs need doing at the same time!

Another idea would be to include 3D imagery to detect if cows are lying in cubicles or not and apply bedding throughout the day so the beds are cleaned more often - but this is probably way out of scope.
Any other thoughts (yes/no/existing machines/what I haven't considered) would be great to help in my research.

 

[Chimera]

Hi all,
Just putting a feeler out there as to what the industy's thoughts would be towards autonomous bedding machines. As a masters student at Harper Adams University I plan to design and build a bedding machine which sweeps and dispenses bedding all by itself, navigating itself through the shed and dropping the sweeping arm and dispensing light bedding (e.g. sawdust) as it goes, it could even start itself if set on a timer.
As a dairy farmer's son I think this will have several advantages by reducing labour and increasing the cleanliness of the beds, but it would bee interesting to hear what people have to say as to where it might fall down, or if it would work quite effectively.
Some gantry-type bedding machines exist where it drops material from above the cubicles but my idea is more like designing the autonomous side of things for the machine in the picture below, so the main advantage being just cutting out a man at the most busy time of day when cows are getting milked and all the shed jobs need doing at the same time!

Another idea would be to include 3D imagery to detect if cows are lying in cubicles or not and apply bedding throughout the day so the beds are cleaned more often - but this is probably way out of scope.
Any other thoughts (yes/no/existing machines/what I haven't considered) would be great to help in my research.

At less than 4 minutes for each 180 cubicle shed with our bobman, the cost would be fairly hard to justify no?

 

[Barmyfarmer]

Elevator/auger system for bedding at the front of cubicles has to be the way forward surely? Simple hand scraper on the beds as cows are pushed out

 

[Chips]

Could be a good soloution for robot farms as it's very time consuming getting every cow up to clean bed and pull sawdust back on top of getting them all out twice a week to top us the fronts with sawdust . Your machine could just go around 24/7 just seeing to any empty cubicles . Would be quite expensive but would remove one of the biggest jobs on a robot farm . To be honest I'm suprised Lely haven't got there first . Maybe you could mount one on the auto scrapers removing the need for propulsion with the farmer just topping up the hopper daily .

 

[Beef farmer]

Hi all,
Just putting a feeler out there as to what the industy's thoughts would be towards autonomous bedding machines. As a masters student at Harper Adams University I plan to design and build a bedding machine which sweeps and dispenses bedding all by itself, navigating itself through the shed and dropping the sweeping arm and dispensing light bedding (e.g. sawdust) as it goes, it could even start itself if set on a timer.
As a dairy farmer's son I think this will have several advantages by reducing labour and increasing the cleanliness of the beds, but it would bee interesting to hear what people have to say as to where it might fall down, or if it would work quite effectively.
Some gantry-type bedding machines exist where it drops material from above the cubicles but my idea is more like designing the autonomous side of things for the machine in the picture below, so the main advantage being just cutting out a man at the most busy time of day when cows are getting milked and all the shed jobs need doing at the same time!

Another idea would be to include 3D imagery to detect if cows are lying in cubicles or not and apply bedding throughout the day so the beds are cleaned more often - but this is probably way out of scope.
Any other thoughts (yes/no/existing machines/what I haven't considered) would be great to help in my research.

This a project or something that you would genuinely like to build and sell?

 

[Agrifool]

Its already there ( partially) you can buy a robot scraper with a brush attachment. No bedder, but I think the company is already working on it

 

[Agrifool]

They have now updated it to bed. Not sure if it applies lime or sawdust

 

[Scholsey]

Could be a good soloution for robot farms as it's very time consuming getting every cow up to clean bed and pull sawdust back on top of getting them all out twice a week to top us the fronts with sawdust . Your machine could just go around 24/7 just seeing to any empty cubicles . Would be quite expensive but would remove one of the biggest jobs on a robot farm . To be honest I'm suprised Lely haven't got there first . Maybe you could mount one on the auto scrapers removing the need for propulsion with the farmer just topping up the hopper daily .

Saw this is Holland, centreless augers made tumps in between 4 head to head cupicles and simply dragged back every couple of days, hopper was at the end of the shed loaded with a loaded shovel.

 

[Joeblue]

Hi all,
Just putting a feeler out there as to what the industy's thoughts would be towards autonomous bedding machines. As a masters student at Harper Adams University I plan to design and build a bedding machine which sweeps and dispenses bedding all by itself, navigating itself through the shed and dropping the sweeping arm and dispensing light bedding (e.g. sawdust) as it goes, it could even start itself if set on a timer.
As a dairy farmer's son I think this will have several advantages by reducing labour and increasing the cleanliness of the beds, but it would bee interesting to hear what people have to say as to where it might fall down, or if it would work quite effectively.
Some gantry-type bedding machines exist where it drops material from above the cubicles but my idea is more like designing the autonomous side of things for the machine in the picture below, so the main advantage being just cutting out a man at the most busy time of day when cows are getting milked and all the shed jobs need doing at the same time!

Another idea would be to include 3D imagery to detect if cows are lying in cubicles or not and apply bedding throughout the day so the beds are cleaned more often - but this is probably way out of scope.
Any other thoughts (yes/no/existing machines/what I haven't considered) would be great to help in my research.

 

[Joeblue]

Sounds like a great idea,should consider a disinfectant sprayer as well on the unit keep me posted on your development cost will b a major concern