Design and Experiment of Row Cleaner with Staggered Disc Teeth for No-Till Planter
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report (New Reviewer)
Excellent work showing new equipment for no-till planting. the parameters studied are sufficient. Except for a few remarks to correct and follow Abstract: improve the abstract Y1 and Y2 as the indicators? the indicator word to change: function, response... Introduction: At the level of the introduction you can integrate the new techniques to minimize tillage...arriving at zero tillage. add ref: -A. Elaoud, R. Jalel, N. Ben Salah, S. Chehaibi, H. Ben Hassen (2021) « Effect of magnetic field on growth and yield of barley treated with different salinity levels». Arabian Journal of Geosciences, DOI: 10.1007/s12517-021-07077-4 -Jalel R., Elaoud A., Ben Salah N., Chehaibi S., Ben Hassen H. (2021) Modeling of soil tillage techniques using Fruchterman–Reingold Algorithm». International Journal of Environmental Science and Technology -H. Ben Hassen, A. Elaoud, Khalil Masmoudi (2020), «Modeling of agricultural soil compaction using discrete Bayesian networks” International journal of Environmental Science and Technology The authors must talk about several variables such as soil resistance and density which indicate the state of the soil. The authors used the regression model: we must talk about the models used by the different authors and then specify this model Results table 4; table 5 shows the probability; fisher...: these values must be used and discussed. Y1 (10) and Y2(11): are equations following a regression: the origin of the constants of these equations must be well illustratedAuthor Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report (Previous Reviewer 1)
I really appreciated the paper for the clarity of the contents and descriptions.
As a general consideration, I would like more attention to be paid to the potential users of this scientific study in agricultural machinery manufacturing companies.
I emphasize that this is not an observation but only my personal suggestion.
Author Response
Thank you very much for your suggestion and affirmation. We will further improve the manuscript based on the opinions of all reviewers.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report (New Reviewer)
(1) The state of the art is not clearly described, and the number of references is too low.
(2) The structure of the paper should be described at the end of the introduction section after the problem statement.
(3) The abstract needs to be focused and achievements needs to be written clearly. Authors should add quantifications of the main results.
(4) The angle of inclination of the disc should have been given with respect to different planes rather than writing inclination and declination.
(5) According to the discussions, I assume the authors have used a multi-sphere method to simulate the straw. A figure is required to show a single straw simulated using 47 spheres
(6) Figure 10: The caption is not written correctly. Figure 10 needs a color legend.
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report (New Reviewer)
This new version are available for publication
This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Review
The paper has some serious issues, it seems like more a technical report than a scientific paper, indeed the structure of the paper must be rewrite.
Abstract: the abstract needs to be focused and achievements needs to be written clearly. Authors should add quantifications of the main results.
Introduction
The state of the art is not clearly described, and the number of references is too low. The problem statement of the research should be described more effectively, along with the objectives The structure of the paper should be described at the end of the introduction section after the problem statement.
Line 36. A numerical quantification of the energy consumption should be provided for rotary tillers as well as for other no-tillage tools, along with the soil disturbance. A cause-effect diagram (Ishikawa diagram) could be more effective to describe the significant factors which affects the energy consumption and the soil disturbance.
Line 41: Is the tool blockage significant for rotary tillers? A brief quantification of the blockage occurrence should be provided and compared with other no-tillage tools.
Material and methods
The materials and methods section must be rewrite. It could be divided into three sections: design, simulation, and experimental validation.
Subsection 1, Design. It may include:
· Analysis on kinematic parameter
· Parametric analysis on Claw teeth
· Blade shape of claw teeth
Subsection 2, Simulation:
· Section 4 without section 4.2.3 Experimental results and analysis which must be placed into the results section.
Subsection 3, Experimental investigation
· Section 5 without section 5.2 Test Results and Analysis which must be placed into the results section.
3. Analysis on Kinematic Parameter
Equation 3 is wrong: the quantity e should be outside the square root.
4. EDEM Simulation Analysis
This section is weak: actually, the soil type and the height of the residue thickness should be considered as factors of the simulation analysis.
Line 342: the work resistance force was not defined. Which is the relationship with the quantities represented in figure 8?
Line 361: considering the central point of the design and its replicates, how could you obtain different results in a numerical simulation, keeping constant the same level of the factors?
5. Field Performance Test.
This section is weak. Authors did not describe any design of experiment and did not show any statistical analysis to support experimental results.
The discussion is shallow and needs more details, the observations and future trends. This section should be connected with other papers and critical comparisons should be added.
Reviewer 2 Report
It is very difficult to understand what the author wanted to express. The manuscript is very poorly written and it needs complete rewriting with correct English.
Many of the terms particularly the angle of inclination of the disc should have been given with respect to different planes rather than writing inclination and declination. The kinematic equations given are not correct.
Some of my observations are marked in the attached file.
Comments for author File: Comments.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
In this manuscript, experimental studies and simulations are used to investigate the performance of discs' teeth staggered row cleaner compared with the traditional flat discs separated row cleaner. Although a scientific method is implemented correctly in this research, the manuscript needs to be edited/rewritten from the abstract to the conclusion. Several paragraphs are written vaguely/incorrectly and the authors' ideas are not well-explained in these paragraphs. There are also a lot of other major writing issues in this manuscript. For instance, there is an extra paragraph copied from the manuscript body at the end of the paper right before the references! Some figure captions are not written correctly and the spacing between the sentences is not observed. Furthermore, I did not understand the link or connection between the DEM simulation section and the experimental section. They seem to be two separate analyses on the same method, but their findings were not compared or validated against each other. For instance, I was expecting to see a validation of the DEM simulations with the experimental results. I suggest breaking this manuscript into two separate manuscripts on the experimental measurements and DEM simulations. Hence, in my opinion, this manuscript requires a fundamental revision before its resubmission.
Other comments:
- Section 4.1.1. The assumption of using 8mm spheres to model the soil is far from reality and it is not justified in the manuscript. Besides, the chosen values for the physical properties of soil/straw are not referenced/justified.
- According to the discussions, I assume the authors have used a multi-sphere method to simulate the straw. A figure is required to show a single straw simulated using 47 spheres and to what extent this assembly of spherical particles resembles the real shape of the straw.
- Figure 10: The caption is not written correctly. Figure 10 needs a color legend.
