Accident prevention in agricultural machinery using radiofrequency technology: A prototype application to olive net collectors

Machine related injuries and fatalities are a major concern across industries. Furthermore, machine safety in the agriculture sector is critical due to the high-risk nature of agricultural work, which often involves heavy machinery and equipment. This study investigates radiofrequency systems designed to improve worker safety when operating olive net collectors and similar machinery. An RFID prototype safety device with IoT capabilities was developed and tested. The study also provides an overview of inductive coupling antennas, including a design methodology that consider various shapes. MATLAB code is provided as supplementary material to this paper for calculating inductance, a key parameter of inductive coupling antennas. A custom 3D antenna based on a rectangular shape was designed an integrated with an olive net collector. The entire system was evaluated using a robotic approach, and a set of statistics was obtained to assess its performance. The conducted tests demonstrate that the developed prototype effectively sends an emergency stop signal and serves as a safety barrier, highlighting its potential benefits.