The maturity of Korla fragrant pears directly influences their harvesting, packaging, transportation, and storage. Investigating the mechanical properties of fragrant pears at various maturity stages can help minimize damage during postharvest handling. This study employs micro-CT technology combined with reverse model scanning to develop a numerical model for force damage across different maturity stages, supported by experimental validation. The results demonstrate that both rupture force and rupture strain progressively decrease as the maturity of Korla fragrant pears increases, exhibiting a sudden transition. Simultaneously, the fruit’s microstructure shifts from distinct cellular organization to an irregular, collapsed state. The proposed numerical model, which accounts for this abrupt change, provides a better fit than models based on a single physical parameter, with the R² value improving from 0.7922 to 0.9665. Furthermore, this model accurately quantifies the mechanical properties of fragrant pears at all stages of maturity. These findings offer technical support for reducing postharvest losses and serve as a reference for developing damage prediction models for other fruits and vegetables.

In response to the urgent need for full-process mechanization in Xinjiang’s cotton–cumin intercropping system, and to address the prominent bottlenecks of missing equipment for key harvesting steps and reliance on manual operations, we developed a cumin harvester and investigated its operating mechanisms. Guided by the agronomic parameters of the intercropping system, we executed a system-level design centered on the header unit, performed multi-objective optimization using orthogonal experiments and regression modeling, and conducted field validation. Results show: stubble height of 32.6 mm, harvester reel speed of 28 r/min, and forward speed of 3.26 km/h. Under this parameter configuration, the harvest rate was 89.54%, and the average damage rate was 7.33%. Field trials indicated a harvest rate of 88.2% and an average damage rate of 5.6%, with deviations from model predictions of 1.34% and 1.73%. The optimal reel index (λ = 1.69), the longitudinal component of the reel tine motion, prevents repeated impacts on the plants, reducing shattering and threshing damage; the axial component provide reliable support and smooth guidance to the stalks, ensuring continuous, steady cutting; the optimized stubble height is lower than the plant’s center of mass.

The crushing of used drip irrigation tape is a crucial step in the recycling and reuse of drip irrigation tapes. Incomplete crushing and low efficiency are among the main factors restricting its reprocessing. Investigating the fracture characteristics and the mechanism of fracture during the crushing process is key to solving this problem. Therefore, this study constructs a stretching fracture platform to investigate the influence of stretching speed on the fracture characteristics and reveals the fracture mechanism by analyzing fracture morphology, force-displacement curves, fracture energy, and microstructure. The results show that as the speed increases, the limit strain decreased from 117.7% to 38.7%, and the fracture location always occurs at the junction between the necked and non-necked area, the fracture mode transitions from ductile fracture to brittle fracture, the deformation mode shifts from being dominated by elastoplastic deformation to being dominated by elastic deformation, and the mechanical response curve changes from five stages to three stages. When the stretching speed increases from 60 mm/s to 70 mm/s, a jump phenomenon is observed in macroscopic and microscopic. As the speed increases, the total energy absorbed by the drip irrigation tape decreases from 1.29 × 10⁻² J/mm³ to 0.39 × 10⁻² J/mm³. Brittle fracture primarily absorbs energy for the disintegration and fracture of lamellae in the spherulites at the fracture surface. Ductile fracture primarily absorbs energy for the extension of the fibrous structure, and the mechanical properties of the necked area are strengthened, which leads to the fracture location always occurring at the junction between the necked and non-necked area.

Pneumatic separation is essential in paddy processing, but poor pre-segregation of rice husk–brown rice mixtures causes rice husk retention and brown rice loss. A stepped feeding chute was proposed in this study to enhance the gravity-driven segregation of rice husk–brown rice mixtures before pneumatic separation. The discrete element method was used to simulate particle motion under different step heights and analyze the effects of step height on particle bed porosity, vertical displacement difference, and motion trajectories. Results showed that segregation was governed by the coupled effects of density and surface-roughness differences: brown rice tended to percolate downward, whereas rice husks tended to interlock and remain in the upper layer. The degree of separation first increased and then decreased with increasing step height, owing to the combined influence of porosity-induced changes in vertical displacement difference and impact-induced trajectory fluctuations that promoted remixing. An optimal step height of 13 mm, approximately 1.86 times the brown rice kernel length, reduced rice husk retention by more than 30% and brown rice loss by more than 40%. This design provides an effective approach to improving pneumatic separation. It may also guide the design of segregation-enhanced conveying systems for heterogeneous particulate food materials.