The Impact of the Usage of Autonomous Powered Tractors on the Machine Operating Costs

Magó, László

Keywords: autonomous self-driving power machines, machine operating costs, machine utilization, farm size, power machine categories, C61, O33, Q16

Nowadays robotization is an integral part of the development of agricultural machinery. New machines with autonomous operation appear one after another anticipating the near future, which aims at reducing personal involvement and increasing efficiency in agriculture. Setting aside human labour the production will be less vulnerable to the unfavourable labour market conditions, and under the appropriate technical conditions the improved efficiency and the precision of mechanical work promote the profitability of production in the increasing price competition.
The gradual development of automation has an impact on the trends of mechanization as well. The expansion of robotics is likely to halt the gradual increase in the average size of the machine and tractor power, because in their case the high capacity of the machines is not the primary condition for the effective operation. For the electric powered machines, it is almost unfeasible to work with power tools classified into the category of higher-performance under the current technical conditions. As result of this small robots come to the foreground whose application contains some beneficial elements from the agronomic aspect.
The costs of the use of the autonomous power machines and the tractor fleet should also be taken into account. The cost level of the use of these machines operating in different farm sizes and production technologies is important in terms of farming.
The research examines the impact of the replacement of the power machines of cheap maintenance used on arable farms of different sizes for autonomous ones on the cost level of the operation of power machines in the category of certain tractors and harvesters and last but not least on the total expenses of the machine use. It is essential to determine the impact of the farm size and the machine utilization on the operational cost level of the autonomous machines.

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