FUZZY LOGIC MODEL TO PREDICT WHEAT STRAW MECHANICAL PROPERTIES UNDER VARYING MOISTURE CONTENT AND LOADING RATE.

A fuzzy algorithm was designed for the evaluation of wheat straw mechanical properties such as shear strength, bending strength and young's modulus under influence of moisture contents and loading rates. Wheat straw mechanical properties were measured under controlled moisture contents, i.e. 9.5%, 15.1% and 22.8%, on distinguished internode positions, i.e. IN1, IN2 and IN3 (first, second and third internode, respectively), and with three loading rates, i.e. 10, 20 and 30 mm/min, respectively during year 2013. The results showed that moisture content, loading rate at various internode regions significantly (P<0.05) influenced the shear strength, bending strength and young's modulus. Shear strength (yang mai 16, verity) increased with escalating moisture content and loading rate toward third internode. Whereas bending strength and young's modulus dropped off with the raise of moisture content and loading rate in the direction of the third internode. The proposed mamdani min- max 27 rule based fuzzy model was evaluated with a sub data set from experimental results. Coefficients of determination of relationships for shear strength, bending strength and young's modulus were 0.96, 0.92 and 0.75j, respectively, indicating that the fuzzy logic algorithm for mechanical properties prediction of wheat straw could be regarded as an substitute under the selected experimental conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]