*3.1. Flexible Anti Pod-Dropping Seedling-Lifting Header*

Due to the influence of weather, the harvest of Chinese milk vetch is usually creeped when it becomes mature. In order to reduce the seed loss rate and improve the harvest quality of Chinese milk vetch, the flexible anti pod-dropping seedling-lifting header was designed, as shown in Figure 3a. It is mainly composed of a reel, a divider, four lifters, cutter components, a depth-control equipment, a feeding auger and a side cutter, which can complete the operations of dividing, supporting, poking, cutting, guiding and conveying at one time.

The special lifter for the Chinese milk vetch seed harvester, as shown in Figure 3b, is mainly composed of a seedling-lifted rod head, spring rod connecting plate, spring rod and mounting plate. The seedling-lifted rod head was kept at an angle of 32~38◦ with the ground, and the stems and pods of Chinese milk vetch were guided to the rear by the front seedling-lifted rod head to lift the creeping or lodging Chinese milk vetch to be harvested, so as to avoid the cutter directly contacting the growth segment of Chinese milk vetch pods, and effectively reduce the header loss rate of the Chinese milk vetch seed combine harvester.

The cutter components, as shown in Figure 3c, are composed of a blade guard, cutting blade, left pushed saw-teeth, right pushed saw-teeth, transmitted connecting rod, etc. There were 26 blade guards in total, the type of blade guard was type II double finger, there was a tongue guard at the top of the tip to form a double support for the stems of Chinese milk vetch and the type of cutting blade was standard type II with a blade thickness of 2~3 mm and 6~7 teeth per centimeter of blade length.

**Figure 3.** Schematic diagram of the flexible anti pod-dropping seedling-lifting header and its key parts: (1) reel; (2) divider; (3) lifter; (4) cutter components; (5) depth-control equipment; (6) feeding auger; (7) side cutter; (8) seedling-lifted rod head; (9) connecting plate of spring rod; (10) spring rod; (11) mounting plate; (12) blade guard; (13) cutting blade; (14) left pushed saw-teeth; (15) right pushed saw-teeth; (16) transmitted connecting rod. (**a**) Schematic diagram of the header. (**b**) Lifter for harvesting Chinese milk vetch. (**c**) Cutter components.
