Hydraulic Coconut Climbers

Of course being from India (now I live in Canada) I know those coconut climbing chores very well. The first and foremost question would be why would you use steel sturcture, when today so many very cheap aluminium frames are available. There are even some strong plastic tubing (PVC and others) which can be used also to make the power/effort/strength to weight ratio much better.

Thank you guest for your prompt reply.I need then to know the spec.of these materials and possibly the link if you can?

Please excuse my ignorance, but as I have never come across a coconut climber, could you please forward further details of your design.

thanks

Thanks Hydroscot for your interst .

What I needed is possible GA sketch with Hydraulics in place

Hi Bala,

I am confused! Do you have a design for a Climber, or do you want someone to design it for you?

Theoretically participate in the design philosophy-with state of art ideas + skectches !

Detailed Designing, I can initiate as an Undergraduate project there afterwards

somewhere, so that the students can also have a bite if they like.I have lined up a Mech. engineering dept. of the local college last week towards this, already.

I would suggest that you consider aluminum or an aluminum alloy, for weight and construction costs, plus the energy required to raise the apparatus. More expensive, but even lighter weight might be an engineering plastic, possibly reinforced with an internal metal rod. We use what is called a "cherry picker", which is simply a small, rail enclosed platform on an extendable boom. It can also be as simple as a light weight ladder. In the Philippines, a "coconut climber" is typically an energetic young lad.... My 1st experience in opening a coconut was for my (Filipina) wife, when I went and got a hammer and steel chisel. She said: What ARE you doing!". She took the flat edge of a cleaver, and holding the coconut in her hand, rapped the coconut, fliiped it over, rapped it again, and it opened like an egg. My second mistake was assuming that the liquid therein was coconut milk....

we use the most advanced coconut climers in Hawaii a trained monkey

but they ask for more benifits than traditional workers, the Irish monkeys are always drunk and fighting,we had a monkey from the caribean once who stabbed a coworker, and did you know that a majority of monkeys are jewish i cant get any thing done around Yom-Kippur

to make matters worse there is some scuttlebut about a union, just what i need, raising dates was so much easier...

The closest thing I can think of to a powered coconut tree climber is a motorized climbing tree stand for hunting:

http://www.patents.com/Motorized-climbing-hunting-stand/US20080271948/en-US/

Bill Morrow

Thank you very much Bill.This was very good piece of information I wanted.

I agree with those who suggest an aluminum or aluminum alloy frame (maybe even aluminum alloy/graphite composite structure (like what they use for racing bikes).

However, I'm partial to training monkeys to throw coconuts and getting them mad at eachother or having a Bonzai artist grow you some Bonzai coconut palms so the coconuts are at eye level. Sorry. It was too tempting.

AA 7000 SERIES : Al -Zn -Mg??

Dear Bala Pullat,

I'm pretty sure a mechanical coconut climber could be made. The more important question is, how will the robot know which nut to pluck? Human climbers rely on their senses to select the right nut.

In our country, we produce coconut liquor from the nuts *without* plucking them. But this, too, needs prior selection of the nut, and then attach the tubes that will "harvest" the juice for processing.

So you see, there is some decisions that the robot will need to make. That'll make the machine more expensive. And what plantation owner will bother to invest in them, when he has jobless neighbors who have been doing this for years for a living? the project might not be feasible at all. possible, but not feasible.

Just my humble thoughts.

Dear Langyaw,

I believe he intends for the climber to carry a person up the tree in a bucket similar to what is on a one-man lift.

yeah youre right prof.

I see. but the question remains. who will pay for this machine?

A simple safety belt will not only improve the human climber's job, it will even help him climb faster! I've seen these guys climb a coconut tree, and they're unbelievably fast. I don't think any machine can beat them or help them at what they're doing.

Secondly, setting up the machine on each climb wastes his time, resulting to lower productivity. The plantation owner won't be very happy about this.

My suggestion? An improved climbing gear, similar to what electricians use in climbing electric posts.

..similar to what electricians use .."

I am sure, langyaw you will have a picture of this with you in your files or in up there in your memory.Will you kindly give some clue??

these are the typical safety climbing gear used by an electrical lineman in climbing electric posts.

your coconut climber can use the: 1) belt, 2) strap - to wrap around the tree, 3) the leg anchors to dig into the tree bark for traction in climbing.

here is a lineman in training:

no electricity, no robot, no hydraulic mechanism, just sheer leg and arm power, assisted by safety gear.

Source: http://www.tpub.com/content/construction/14026/css/14026_128.htm

Thank you very much langyaw.You should be given by them the 'best answer' status as no one has ever come up with something having a drop of hydraulics in it till now.May be there is no hydraulic solution yet to what I ask!You have fully otherwise done justice to the question.I am ok with it.

Dear Bala,

I think you can use 50 telescopic self locking cylinders of 1 meter length. of fitting diameters with hydraulic pump, to reach at 50 meters height.

But the problem is the availability of electric power in remote places. Though you can use a vehicle fitted with a pump connected with the engine.

To design please refer books on Hydraulics.

To use a cable winch with a tripod and pully will be much better and safer.

R S Sahni

Please add hydraulic motor to rotate the winch drum.

R S Sahni

The fastest way to harvest coconuts is when you don't need to climb it.

In the Philippines, we don't climb the coconut trees. We use a very long bamboo pole with a hooked blade at its end to cut up the coconut cluster. In one go, dozens of coconuts drop to the ground.

The pole height is adjustable by connecting several bamboo segments end to end. The coconut gatherer will simply move from tree to tree while holding the pole vertically, i.e., without dismantling it, unless he needs to adjust its height.

On the other hand, the lineman's climbing gear is not ideal because it will damage the tree bark in the long run.

Without need to climb, no accidents, no hospitalization, no deaths.

In the end, bamboo is cheap.

If there is really a need to make use of hydraulics, an all terrain man-lift with telescoping boom could be useful. But that was already invented, isn't it?