Automation of a medicinal herb crusher machine applied to the small food industry

Abstract

Currently the consumption of healthy beverages has had a significant increase, more and more people enjoy a tea or some aromatic beverage, this is why demand has influenced the growth of companies responsible for the industrialization of these products, which triggers a search for more efficient industrial processes and faster, the local industry has inefficient processes which do not have adequate feedback and their processes are regulated manually, based on the above, a design of a control architecture, able to optimize the cutting process of a medicinal herb grinding machine depending on the type of cut required, for this architecture we propose 3 main functions: 1) automate the cutting process of medicinal plants, 2) allow the user choose between preset speeds through a control panel, 3) Visualize the process to have a feedback on the current state. The system is based on an embedded controller, which is responsible for reading the speed required by the user and controlling the motor by means of a frequency inverter. The performance of the system was satisfactory, allowing to automate the cutting process, regulating the type of cut and allowing the user to have a feedback through the visualization module implemented.