Combine Harvesting Comes to Stay
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Investigations by the Institute for Research in Agricultural Engineering and the Experience of Users Augurs Well for the Combine Harvester
By Our Agricultural Correspondent THERE is no doubt that for big farms and mechanized holdings the combine -harvester has come to stay, partly as the result of the successful introduction of drying plant.
Many farmers in a large way of business want to see how the combine will behave in a wet season, for ever since the combine began to be used in this country summers have been dry and its work made comparatively easy. How these machines will acquit themselves in a wet summer no one knows. Some people are dubious about it.
Others think that, apart from the usual difficulties of a wet harvest, they will work satisfactorily, and, in the end, owing to the fact that the grain can be artificially dried, produce better results than would the ordinary method of binding and ricking. Better quality is achieved in grain artificially dried than by stacking and threshing in the ordinary way. So far as harvesting on wet days has been necessary, and in dealing with storm-broken grain, the combine method is quite successful.
At one time, the Institute for Research in Agricultural Engineering included in its annual survey of mechanical farms all holdings where the combine was used, but the number of combines now in operation has made the continuance of this practice impossible.
Combine's Rate of Work.
According to the Institute, the average daily rate of work of the combine in statiding corn is about 14 acres, with a yearly capacity of about 300 acres. The chief difficulties limiting the progress of combine harvesters are outlined in "Farm and Machine," Vol. 1, published by the Institute, as follow:—(1) It is not economic to purchase a combine unless 250-300 acres of corn are to be harvested each year; (2) straw is not harvested so well as in the ordinary method; (3) the sample of grain is not so good as that obtained from a finishing drum; (4) weed seeds are deposited in the field.
As regards the first objection, two new machines of smaller capacity, B38
known as baby combines, have been introduced and reports on their work, this season, are satisfactory. Referring to the other objections, attention is being devoted to the production of more modern equipment for cleaning grain after threshing, and for dealing more satisfactorily with straw. It may be that, in the attempt to reduce the weight of the combine, grain cleaning will, in future, be done in the barn.
A serious rival to the combine is the old standard method brought up to date. This embraces the power binder and -low-built tractor-trailers, which haul the corn to the rick. On the other hand, Ransomes, Sims and Jefferies, Ltd., has introduced an amplified system of threshing in the field, which promises well.
The field is cleared in one operation, no straw being left. Cut by a power reaper, the loose grain is carried from the reaper canvas by an elevator and delivered on to sweeps, which convey it to the thresher in the field, the threshed grain being subsequently taken by lorry to the drier at the farm. From a practical point of view and considering harvest needs outside the big farms, this method offers many advantages, particularly as the drying is so good.
There is no gainsaying the fact that any method which helps the corn grower to save his crop in a wet season is valuable. Any process, too, that assists in the preparation of the grain, so as to satisfy the miller and the maltster, will be welcomed by corn growers.
Mr. Roland Dudley, of Hampshire, one of the pioneers of farm mechanization, says that, given the facilities for drying the grain artificially, it is now possible to use in this country the combine harvester thresher without any difficulty, and he offers the following advice for using the outfit:—
The grain must be dead ripe, whether it be wheat, barley or oats. In the case of wheat, there is a distinct gain in yield over binder-cut wheat. One sack of tail in 260 sacks of goodrnillable wheat is about the proportion, as compared with, perhaps, 10 per cent, tail corn with binder-cut wheat. In any rase, barley must be dead ripe if it is to be used for malting.
On the other hand, many farmers with large holdings employ the modified system of threshing in the field by the use of sweeps, and the type favoured is that used in the hayfield.
Progress of the Combine.
The first combine to be put into commercial service was on the farm of Messrs. Dunn, of Flamstead bury, Hampshire. In 1934 there were 60 of these machines in use in England and Scotland, and this year there are more.
The combine was first introduced into Scotland in 1932. An account of the experience in operating this machine in 1933 is given by Mr. L. M. Walker in the Scottish Journal of Agriculture for July, 1935. The machine was used in connection with a system of mechanized corn growing on two farms in East Lothian. The conclusion is reached that the machine amply justified itself as an indispensable unit in mechanized grain production.
In conclusion, I would like to draw attention, for the benefit of barley growers, to a note by the Institute for Research in Agricultural Engineering, in its report included in" Farm and Machine," Vol. 2. It is noted with gratification " that the • prejudice against malting barley from combine harvesters, which was manifested last season (1933) in many districts by a refusal on the part of many buyers to deal, in it, has now been overcome and combined malting barley now finds a good sale. . . ."