How are they used in Harvest Assist?
See this video which runs through things you can do to help Burros run smoothly. In short, relatively clean rows without too many weeds or vines hanging down, push packing tables to the opposite row and pick out full rows so that Burros can enter/exit easily, and train your crews so they understand how best to use Burro.
The images below illustrate how we see table grape growers laying out their harvesting crews on top, and the optimal way we have observed to harvest with Burros below.
Setup 1: 6-8 people / Burro in a group
- videos here, here, and here
- Totes are ID’ed with no leaf, one leaf, dried leaf or a stick
- Users become a group, and are responsible for operating Burros, but teams remain
- Consistent gains (20-30% gains across 6-8 people)
Central Field Pack
- Some growers are moving to Central Field Pack production. In this style use, the pack team is a production line with the process of packing broken down
- Pickers pick field totes and scan them onto Burro (video here); data goes online for management
- People paid individually for performance
- 30-50%+ gains across 6-8 people / robot, with better QC are attainable in this format, although it requires more extensive production workflow changes
