High speed intelligent classifier of tomatoes by colour, size and weight

At present most horticultural products are classified and marketed according to quality standards, which provide a common language for growers, packers, buyers and consumers. The standardisation of both product and packaging enables greater speed and efficiency in management and marketing. Of all the vegetables grown in greenhouses, tomatoes are predominant in both surface area and tons produced. This paper will present the development and evaluation of a low investment classification system of tomatoes with these objectives: to put it at the service of producing farms and to classify for trading standards. An intelligent classifier of tomatoes has been developed by weight, diameter and colour. This system has optimised the necessary algorithms for data processing in the case of tomatoes, so that productivity is greatly increased, with the use of less expensive and lower performance electronics. The prototype is able to achieve very high speed classification, 12.5 ratings per second, using accessible and low cost commercial equipment for this. It decreases fourfold the manual sorting time and is not sensitive to the variety of tomato classified. This system facilitates the processes of standardisation and quality control, increases the competitiveness of tomato farms and impacts positively on profitability. The automatic classification system described in this work represents a contribution from the economic point of view, as it is profitable for a farm in the short term (less than six months), while the existing systems, can only be used in large trading centers.