Prototype of a Coconut Harvesting Robot with Visual Feedback

This paper discusses about the design and development of a semi-autonomous robot that is intended for harvesting coconuts. The robot is composed of two parts: the climbing mechanism and the harvesting mechanism. The harvesting mechanism consists of a robotic arm with three degrees of freedom and has a circular saw as the end effector. It also consists of a camera that is fixed on the wrist of the robotic arm, with which the video of the tree top is sent to the ground station in real time. For this a Linux-based ARM board is used. The climbing mechanism consists of a circular chassis. Three wheels that are powered by DC motors with sufficient torque are set at equal distance around the coconut tree. There are another three motors that ensure sufficient tightening of the climbing mechanism to the coconut tree. The climbing part also has a special mechanism to rotate around the coconut tree, so that the robotic arm gets full coverage around the coconut tree. The entire movement of the robot is controlled from the ground station, using a remote controller.