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The Agricultural Machinery Unit (UMA) at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC) participated in the CULTISENSOR project to design, manufacture and validate a sensing subsoiler prototype for soil decompaction. This instrument allows mapping and interpretation of the physical conditions of soil when fieldwork activities are being carried out.
The prototype has a platform to capture data so that the information collected in the field can be centralised and operations traced.
The goal was to digitalise a subsoiler, an agricultural tool capable of breaking and aerating the subsoil without overturning the topsoil layer. A subsoiler is valuable for working in areas where the soil is more compacted due to the constant passage of heavy machinery or because of natural processes. Digitalisation provides electronic control and enables mapping of the soil resistance, which is expected to be related to its compaction. Installing a pressure sensor allows variations in the oil pressure of the subsoiler's hydraulic pistons to be collected. These variations can be monitored by taking geolocated records second by second, which indirectly provides a map of the soil's resistance to advancement.
Consortium, budget and financing
The project was led by the FEMAC Cluster, with the collaboration of the INNOVI Cluster. It involved companies from the FEMAC cluster, WAATIC Company SL, JYMPA FUTURAGRO SL and AKIS INTERNATIONAL SL as developers of the technological solution, and the EUDALD MASSANA winery as an end user.
The project started in May 2023 and finished in April 2024. It was financed with funds from the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism), within Support for Innovative Business Associations Grants, aimed at increasing the competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises. The budget was 19,361 euros.
Related Projects
- The Centre for Industrial Equipment Design (CDEI) at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC), together with the IRI, Institut de Robòtica i Informàtica Industrial (CSIC-UPC), is participating in the development of a pre-commercial prototype of an automatic portable sawmill that integrates computer vision, artificial intelligence and computer numerical control to improve productivity, efficiency and safety in local wood processing for the company Envall Coop. S.L.
STOR-HY: More flexible, efficient and resilient hydropower storage for the European electricity grid
The Center for Industrial Diagnostics (CDIF) at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC) coordinates the European STOR-HY project, which develops digital tools, monitoring systems and advanced models to optimise the operation of pumped-storage hydropower plants and reduce their investment and maintenance costs.- The Advanced Network Architectures Lab (CRAAX) at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC) is participating in the ACCOMPLISH project, which is developing an innovative AI-based compliance and certification framework to simplify, integrate and automate compliance in operations, assets, solutions and organisational processes related to data and artificial intelligence.
- A team from the Resources Recovery and Environmental Management (R2EM) group, of the Barcelona Research Center in Multiscale Science and Engineering (CCEM), at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC), is participating in the MagNa project, which is developing an innovative system to recover magnesium from the brines generated by the seawater desalination process. The recovered materials will be used for industrial purposes and will help reduce Europe’s trade dependence.
