The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, April 21, 1919, Page 11

- h/ “3 DLl A ‘ =R S e -s&{‘ - most modern of mold-board Inventor of Steam Engine Had Tractor Idea 170 Years Ago—Rapid -ngelopment Since 1900—No T'ractor for All Kinds of Work (Mr. Mueller is a graduate of the North Dakota Agricultural college and is now en- gaged ‘in manufacturing farm machinery in Minneapolis, Minn. BY H. M. MUELLER HILE James Watt, the man who discovered the steam engine, had a tractor_idea, it remained for Monsieur Cugnot, an officer in the French army, to actually construct a tractor, which was finished in the year 1770. But it blew up with a bang on the first trial. The tractor idea slept for a century, and it was only with the in- vention of much new farm machinery- early in the twentieth century that the subject of power farming was seriously considered by the agricultural engi- 1Y neers of the day. DV W The perfection of the in- ternal combustion engine in another field turned the inventive minds to its use as a source of power for tractors. The first successful gas tractor was put on the market in 1903. Like the first ponderous steam rigs, they were heavy and required power- ful motors. ; . The mechanical evolution of the automobile and the tractor bear striking likeness. We had one, two, three and four-wheel automobiles. Here in the United States we have had a “walking tractor” —a machine without wheels that walked like a man—or at least was supposed to. We have had one and two-wheeled rigs, and .some three-wheeled types are still popular. A man ohce built a tractor sporting five big wheels, and, of course, we have had the caterpillar or crawler type. But the trac- tor, like the automobile, is working steadily back to the standard four-wheel machines. LITTLE IMPROVEMENT IN WHEELS Speaking of wheels, let it be known, notwith- standing the fact that the wheels—the source- of traction—is one of the most important features of the tractor, there has been less improvement in the tractor wheel than any other feature of the machine, in fact, the same type of wheel used for the old, heavy, cumbersome steam rig is thg fashion of today. Recently from Italy a new tractor wheel has come forth embodying the principle of the out and in lug, a decided advantage over the fixed lug, while in America, the: same thought has been car- ried to a higher degree of perfection, and a wheel produced wherein the lug is pushed into the ground at point of contact and held firmly until the full degree of traction has been secured, and then the lug is withdrawn as the machine travels forward, eliminating the prying up, with its loss of power, as under the old methods. The caterpillar or tank tread, while popular in many sections, has never as yet ousted the better types of wheels as a superior source of traction. With a higher degree of traction, the tractor will prove practically unlimited in its adaptability to farm use. out that even today it is the limitation of the plow and not the tractor which makes of the tractor a one- ¢ . job-at-a-time outfit. Even the m In ancient Egypt. and disc plows are limited to plowing. And plowing is pure- ly a preliminary to several other jobs. As long as this is true, food production will be held close to its present level. A bright light of promise in the sky of in- vention which seems to offer a relief from the lagging of the plow is in a new type of tiller, a machine that plows, discs, harrows and packs the ground in one trip over the field. This machine when pulled by a tractor would enable the tractor to jump production to a high level, indeed, to an unprecedented degree. The present high price of gasoline or petrol and the possibility of its becoming even dearer is a cloud over the tractor industry. Confidentially, no tractor manufacturer or gasoline engine expert = The plow limits agriculture. Indeed, it should be carefully pointed. " will admit that a motor built to burn gasoline does _ not reach its full efficiency with kerosene, distillate or coal gas. A combination motor, burning both gasoline and kerosene, equipped with two carburetors is prom- ised, and there is hint also of a new steam rig with a flash boiler on the lines of a recent steam auto- mobile construction, and the fuel problem has even . led the experimenters into the field of electrically propelled agricultural implements. In Switzerland there is-an electric cultivator, in Germany there is an electric plow, and in Minneapolis there is an electric tractor, all, confessedly, in more or less of an experimenta] stage. While these things are interesting, it can be said that only a revolution in the- mechanical world could at the present oust the internal combustionengine from its wuniversal position. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS AUNIVERSAL TRACTOR. No busi- ness man would send a little Ford car to fetch a load that would strain a Packard truck, nor will he send a three-ton truck with all of its ex- pense of upkeep and operation on a job the Ford can handle. A small farmer could mnot afford to even buy gasoline for a tractor that would pull 12 plows. On the other hand, the “wholesale farmer”—the man farming many thousands of acres of land—would not get anywhere with a one- bottom outfit. . Just what is the right number of plows for the right-sized tractor to pull is a problem now being worked out. Yerxes—United States agri- cultural department—says four bottoms; the manufacturers and the popular demand is for a three-bottom rig. A man operating a me- dium-sized farm can afford a tractor pulling Power plowing, the new idea. three bottoms. The larger farmer had better have two tractors pulling three bottoms than to have one tractor pulling six bottoms. One six-bottom rig laid up for repairs would stop operations, while one three-bottom rig in the shop would leave the other unit at work, and at harvest two medium-sized tractors would be far handier than one large one. The two-bot- tom rig is also a popular size and will prob- ably remain so on account of its economy of operation, versatility and price. : TRACTOR FOR TRUCK GARDENER TOO And the truck gardener, too, has had his inter- ests taken care of by the little garden tractor, strong enough to pull a small plow share and vari- ous garden truck cultivating tools. Its reception was instantaneous, and they are growing daily in popularity, allowing the truck gardener to cultivate double the amount of land possible under old methods. The superiority of the gas tractor over the steam rig is at once apparent. It eliminated- the neces- sity of burning and carrying bulky fuels, the trou- blesome work of hauling water to the boiler and the large number of men required to operate it. Although superior to the steam outfit, the develop- ment of the gas tractor has been slow up to the last two years, since when its growth has been, indeed, phenomenal. One authority says: “The recent sudden development of the gas tractor has been one of the marvels of the history of agricul- ture.” . d / A The manufacturer of the first successful gas trac- tor in 1903 had put out, by the year 1910, over 2,000 machines. - The second successful manufac- turer of gas tractors entered the field in 1907, and 'PAGE ELEVEN America revolutionized plowing from that time on the gas tractor producers mul- tiplied almost as rapidly as did manufacturers of automobiles in the old days. In 1914 the so-called “small tractor craze” was at its height, promising the small farmer the same benefits from power plowing as the large operator who farmed on the wholesale basis. In the year 1915 tractor demon- strations throughout the Middle West were at- tended by throngs of farmers coming long dis- tances—over 200,000 farmers attending a five-day demonstration at a little town in Nebraska, the normal population of which is but 4,500 péople. The world war and the use of the tractor as a transport for artillery and the necessity of em- ploying it to speed up the production of grain to feed the fighting men in the trenches, has opened up a golden opportunity for the tractor the world over. Where once the manufacturer had to force the tractor upon the farm- er, now the farmer has adopted it as his very own. Where once sales were hard to make, now the conditions are reversed, and farmers are fighting h for the opportunity to buy. The one-foot surface of earth covering a half gection of land contains 600,000,000 tons of soil, and in this mass of earth is the farmer’s treasure vault, which can be unlocked only with the plow and the tractor. SPEEDER OF YESTERDAY BLOCKS TRAFFIC NOW The tractor is here—its international popularity is an assured fact. Already it is being made in a variety of sizes and types to fit the needs of every farmer in every country the world over. Admit- tedly, the perfect tractor is not yet a reality, but manufacturers are daily, almost hourly, improving designs. Producers have done wonders in so quick- ly bringing out the practical tractor, for it is, in- deed, a far cry from the days of “the man with the hoe” to the spectacle of a tractor going down the field at a speed of three and one-half miles per hour, pulling one-half dozen 14-inch plows at a foot depth. It is, indeed, a different world today. And to- morrow will show us still a different life. The period when man is required to dig in the ditch, to get money to buy bread, to get the strength to dig in the ditch, is ended. . The speeder of yesterday is, today, convicted of blocking traffic. The complexity of our daily life has demanded machines here and machines there— a machine for this and a machine to do that—with a big machine requiring a swarm of little machines to keep the big one going. ‘ In fact, it can truly be said that the world’s cry today is for machines, machines, machines. It has been demonstrated, times without number, that any new contrivance, no matter how peculiar its shape, no matter how revolutionary its charac- ter, if it promises to increase yields and reduce farm labor, will be given its chance. So, let the mechanical prophet have his visions, and let the inventive dreamer dream, for, out of the multiples -of types, designs, experiments and theories, will come the ultimate tractor—the per- . fect machine. The advent of such a trac- tor will be virtually giving “wings to the plow.” One horse, pulling one plow, turn- ing one furrow at a time, is limited to the speed of two-and one-half miles per hour. Every five square miles of plowing with such an outfit means a dis- tance traveled of 25,000 miles, or one single fur- row completely around the whole earth. But the tractor, pulling a gang plow, turning 12 furrows at once, at a speed of three and one-half miles per hour, is equal to a single plow ripping through the earth at a rate of 40 MILES AN HOUR. Imagine it. That is “speeding up the plow” with a ven- geance. This is not, however, a theory, nor a- prophecy, but an actual, present-day fact; which explains how, through the use of the gas tractor, the labor time required to produce a bushel of wheat has been reduced from three hours down to ten and one-half minutes, and the cost from 17% cents to 3% cents per bushel. methods. English plow—1730.