Design development and testing of an integrated bamboo culm splitting and planing machine

This research paper discusses the design, development and testing of an integrated splitting and planing machine for pre-cut bamboo culms. The design of the bamboo splitting section was based on existing design of commercially available bamboo splitting machine while the planing section utilized 2 sets of motor powered portable wood planers integrated into the design which simultaneously planes the top and bottom sides of the bamboo strip. The separation of split bamboo strips and sequential transfer to the planing section was designed by the authors and consisted of axial-mounted vanes within a cylindrical pipe that separate the split bamboo strips and move each strip sequentially to an exit slide onto a chain feeder to the planing section. The automation of the process utilized an Arduino Mega microcontroller board which controlled a stepper motor drive and relays to control the feeding chain motor to the planing section. The testing of the individual processes of bamboo culm splitting and strip planing were tested satisfactorily, however, the process of separating the split bamboo strips and sequential feeding to the planing section infeed chain conveyor require further improvements as misalignment problems were observed. The complete process of splitting a 1.2 meter length of bamboo into 8 strips, separation and sequential feeding to the planer and planing process required around 165—170 seconds to complete, however, the strip transfer process had only a reliability of 80%.