Structure Design and Image Recognition Research of A Picking Device on the Apple Picking Robot

Abstract Picking robot is the inevitable trend of the development of orchard harvester technology in the future. However, automatic apple picking technology is difficult to achieve because of uncertainty in distribution, inconsistent maturity, and uneven quality and other issues. It is hard to locate the position of apples accurately. Therefore, after summarizing the advantages and disadvantages of apple harvesting technology at laboratory and abroad, a picking device was designed. The device is based on the purpose of distinguishing the maturity of apples and consists of shell, cutting device, power device. It can achieve efficient and rapid fruit picking and more accurate differentiation of maturity. For other similar spherical fruit also has some applicability.