1. An air seed meter for an agricultural planter, comprising:
a housing with an inner chamber;
a disc mounted in said housing for rotation about an axis and having a plurality of seed cells spaced radially about the axis for retaining seeds, said disc having an internal gear comprising gear teeth oriented toward the axis of the disc; and
a power source with an output shaft and an external gear mounted to said output shaft, said external gear engaged with the internal gear of said disc to directly control the rotational speed of the disc;
said output shaft having an axis that is separate from the axis of the disc.
2. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the power source is an electric motor.
3. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the gear ratio of the internal gear to the external gear of the disc is 12:1.
4. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the internal gear is positioned between an outer edge of the disc and the axis.
5. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the disc comprises a flanged portion between an inner lip and an outer chamfer.
6. The air seed meter of claim 5 wherein the internal gear is positioned inward from the inner lip of the flanged portion of the disc.
7. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the output shaft and external gear of the power source extend at least partially through a seed meter side of the housing.
8. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the output shaft and external gear of the power source extend at least partially through a vacuum side of the housing.
9. The air seed meter of claim 1 wherein the internal gear is formed integrally with the seed disc.
10. A direct drive assembly for a seed metering system having a housing with an inner chamber, and a seed disc housed in the housing, comprising:
an internal gear integrated with the seed disc, said internal gear concentric to an axis of the seed disc and comprising gear teeth oriented toward the axis of the disc; and
a power source with an output shaft and an external gear mounted to said output shaft, said external gear engaged with the internal gear of said seed disc to directly control the rotational speed of the seed disc;
said output shaft having an axis that is separate from the rotational axis of the disc.
11. The assembly of claim 10 wherein said power source is fixed to an exterior of the housing in a manner that the output shaft projects at least partially into the housing.
12. The assembly of claim 11 wherein the power source is fixed to a seed meter side of the housing, with the output shaft extending at least partially through the seed meter side and into engagement with the internal gear.
13. The assembly of claim 11 wherein the power source is fixed to a vacuum side of the housing, with the output shaft extending at least partially through the vacuum side and into engagement with the internal gear.
14. The assembly of claim 10 wherein the power source comprises an electric motor, a hydraulic rotary motor, or a pneumatic rotary motor.
15. The assembly of claim 10 wherein the internal gear is formed integrally with the seed disc.
16. The assembly of claim 10 wherein the internal gear is positioned to face towards the axis of the seed disc.
17. A seed disc for use in a seed meter of an agricultural implement, comprising:
a cylindrical structure having first and second sides and containing a plurality of apertures therethrough, said apertures being arranged in a radial array a distance from an axis of the structure; and
an internal gear positioned generally inward of the apertures and comprising gear teeth facing the axis of the cylindrical structure;
wherein the internal gear is configured to engage a power source to provide rotational velocity to the seed disc, with said power source including an output shaft that is separate from the rotational axis of the disc.
18. The seed disc of claim 17 wherein the internal gear is formed integrally with the cylindrical structure.
19. The seed disc of claim 17 further comprising a flanged portion between an inner lip and an outer chamfer.
20. The seed disc of claim 19 wherein the internal gear is positioned inward from the inner lip of the flanged portion of the disc.
The claims below are in addition to those above.
All refrences to claim(s) which appear below refer to the numbering after this setence.
1.-20. (canceled)
21. A method comprising:
receiving a redundancy version including a plurality of redundancy version bits;
soft combining the redundancy version bits with corresponding buffered bits to generate corresponding soft combined bits;
comparing the soft combined bits with the corresponding buffered bits to identify changed bits and unchanged bits; and
storing the changed bits in a buffer to thereby replace the buffered bits that correspond to the changed bits.
22. The method of claim 21, wherein receiving the redundancy version includes receiving the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ).
23. The method of claim 21, wherein comparing the soft combined bits with the corresponding buffered bits to identify changed bits and unchanged bits includes setting a value of the unchanged bits to a neutral value and discarding the unchanged bits having the neutral value.
24. The method of claim 21, wherein receiving the redundancy version includes receiving the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ); and wherein storing the changed bits includes storing the changed bits in an external HARQ buffer.
25. The method of claim 21, wherein receiving the redundancy version includes receiving the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ); and wherein storing the changed bits includes storing the changed bits in an internal HARQ buffer.
26. The method of claim 21, wherein soft combining the redundancy version bits with corresponding buffered bits to generate the corresponding soft combined bits includes soft combining to generate the corresponding soft combined bits, the soft combined bits being probability values indicative of whether a respective coded bit is a one or a zero.
27. An apparatus comprising:
at least one processor,
at least one memory including computer program code,
the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to at least:
receive a redundancy version including a plurality of redundancy version bits;
soft combine the redundancy version bits with corresponding buffered bits to generate corresponding soft combined bits;
compare the soft combined bits with the corresponding buffered bits to identify changed bits and unchanged bits; and
store the changed bits in a buffer to thereby replace the buffered bits that correspond to the changed bits.
28. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the apparatus caused to receive the redundancy version includes being caused to receive the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ).
29. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the apparatus caused to compare the soft combined bits with the corresponding buffered bits to identify changed bits and unchanged bits includes being caused to set a value of the unchanged bits to a neutral value and discard the unchanged bits having the neutral value.
30. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the apparatus caused to receive the redundancy version includes being caused to receive the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ); and wherein the apparatus caused to store the changed bits includes being caused to store the changed bits in all external HARQ buffer.
31. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the apparatus caused to receive the redundancy version includes being caused to receive the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ); and wherein the apparatus caused to store the changed bits includes being caused to store the changed bits in an internal HARQ buffer.
32. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the apparatus caused to soft combine the redundancy version bits with corresponding buffered bits to generate the corresponding soft combined bits includes being caused to soft combine to generate the corresponding soft combined bits, the soft combined bits being probability values indicative of whether a respective coded bit is a one or a zero.
33. A computer program product comprising a computer-readable medium bearing computer program code embodied therein for use with a computer, the computer program code comprising:
code for receiving a redundancy version including a plurality of redundancy version bits;
code for soft combining the redundancy version bits with corresponding buffered bits to generate corresponding soft combined bits;
code for comparing the soft combined bits with the corresponding buffered bits to identify changed bits and unchanged bits; and
code for causing the changed bits to be stored in a buffer to thereby replace the buffered bits that correspond to the changed bits.
34. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein receiving the redundancy version include receiving the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ).
35. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein comparing the soft combined bits with the corresponding buffered bits to identify changed bits and unchanged bits include setting a value of the unchanged bits to a neutral value and discard the unchanged bits having the neutral value.
36. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein receiving the redundancy version include receiving the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ); and wherein storing the changed bits include storing the changed bits in an external HARQ buffer.
37. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein receiving the redundancy version include receiving the redundancy version in response to an implementation of a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ); and wherein causing the changed bits to be stored include causing the changed bits to be stored in an internal HARQ buffer.
38. The computer program product of claim 33, wherein the soft combined bits being probability values indicative of whether a respective coded bit is a one or a zero.