*Article* **Design and Experiment of a Sowing Quality Monitoring System of Cotton Precision Hill-Drop Planters**

**Shenghe Bai 1,2, Yanwei Yuan 1,2,\*, Kang Niu 2, Zenglu Shi 3, Liming Zhou 2, Bo Zhao 2, Liguo Wei 2, Lijing Liu 1,2, Yuankun Zheng 1, Sa An <sup>2</sup> and Yihua Ma <sup>2</sup>**


**Abstract:** To realize the real-time monitoring of the cotton precision seeding operation process and improve the intelligence level of cotton precision planters, based on automatic color matching detection technology and visualization technology, this study designs a monitoring system for the sowing quality of cotton precision planters. The monitoring system is based on the double-silo turntable type cotton vertical disc hole seed metering device as the research carrier, and is composed of a missed seeding monitoring module and a visualization module. Among them, the missed seeding monitoring module includes an incremental rotary encoder, color code electric eye color fiber optic sensor, color code sensor amplifier, etc.; the visualization module includes data acquisition module, industrial computer, and so on. The missing seeding monitoring module is installed on the seed spacer of the cotton precision seed metering device. It uses Labview software for graphical programming and is equipped with a multi-functional industrial computer. It realizes the monitoring of parameters such as the number of sowings, the number of missed sowings, the speed of the hole seeder, the forward speed of the machine, and the sowing area. The results of the bench test and field test of the sowing monitoring system showed that the accuracy rate of the system's broadcast monitoring was over 93%, and the accuracy rate of missed broadcast monitoring was over 91%. The system solved the technical problem that cotton film-laying and sowing were not easy to detect. It could accurately detect the quality of cotton sowing in real time and meet the actual requirements of sowing monitoring.

**Keywords:** cotton precision planter; cotton seeds; broadcast monitoring; missed broadcast monitoring; sowing quality
