Route-planning in output-material-flow arable farming operations aiming for soil protection

Abstract

This paper presents two approaches for route planning in output-material-flow arable farming: one for time optimization and one for soil protection. The two approaches were used to plan the routes of one harvester and one transport vehicle performing a harvesting operation in a test field, and were compared by analyzing the operation duration, travel distance, and area driven over by the machines. The results show the benefits and drawbacks of planning the machine routes using the proposed method for soil protection: the plans can reduce the impact of driving over the soil, but it can result in higher operation durations and traveled distances