FEM Analysis of ROPS for Agricultural Self-Moving Machines

The high number of accidents due to a rolling over of agricultural machineries increases the interest of researchers and organisations for standardisation in this field. In the Fifties, standards to test rolling over protective structures (ROPS) for tractors were designed and approved, the same was not defined for agricultural self-moving machines. In the present work an analysis of different categories of agricultural self-moving machines is executed with the goal of evaluating the possibility to introduce ROPS solutions used in tractors. Three categories of agricultural self-moving machines were chosen in function of their dimensions, mass, operations performed, and their diffusion on the Italian and European market. On each machine, an evaluation of the capability to adopt a solution to protect the conducers from rolling over, like to tractors, was analysed. The ROPS design was obtained using a dedicated software to evaluate the resistance of the structures installed at the moment to protect conducers only from environmental aspects, and to design structures able to resist the load cycle imposed by the standards. The results have shown a low resistance level of the structures used at the moment on the machines chosen for the tests. The structures able to sustain the loads imposed by the standards are not too different with regards to dimensions, but an increase of the resistance of the materials or an increase of the thickness of the mountings is necessary.