MACHINES FOR THRASHING AND SEPARATING.
The powers in common use for driving thrashing-machines are steam engines, lever-powers, and horse-tread powers, of which the latter have many advantages over all others, as they may be easily conveyed from one place to another, may be placed on the barn floor where the thrashing is to be performed, and require little preparation and few men to run them. Figure i 6o) shows a two-horse tread-power, the upper por tion being the enclosure in which the horses work, while the lower part consists of a travelling platform, operating on anti-friction rollers moving over cylindrical drums, one of which is at rest while the other revolves. On one side of the revolving drum, at the head of the machine, is a large gear-wheel, which engages with the cogs on the band-wheel shaft, which latter is caused to revolve by the platform passing over its periphery.
Figure 2 illustrates a combined thrasher and cleaner, by which the grain is completely separated from the straw and delivered ready cleaned into bags. The machine is of simple construction, light-running, and effective. The cylinder is made either of wood or of iron; in the latter form strong wrought-iron bars running lengthwise contain steel teeth, which are fastened to the bars with screw-nuts. The concave, which is in two parts, is of iron lined with wood and furnished with steel teeth, and is made adjustable by set-screws. The belt that drives the cylinder shaft operates the various parts of the machine, thus avoiding a complica tion of belts or gear. Other attachments, not shown in the Figure, are a " tailings "-elevator and a straw-stacker.
Figure 9 illustrates a straw-stacker and the form of stack which it constructs. This stacker can be attached to any separator by bolting a wooden pulley on the outside of some convenient pulley on the separator and running from this pulley a belt back to the stacker. By an automatic device the carrier is swung round, and in passing moves so slowly that in a half revolution it makes a good layer of straw all over the stack. When not in use, it can be folded back on the wagon, upon which it is fixed.
The I Yaor Clover-huller (fig. 3) combines in one machine an appara tus for hulling, separating, and winnowing the seed and placing it in a bag. The upper huller, into which the clover is first fed, consists of an under-shot open iron-bar cylinder (fig. 4), which is provided with steel
fluted rubbers and so revolves in a concave, also provided with fluted rub bers, that the edges of the revolving rubbers in the cylinder pass between the edges of the rubbers in the concave, thereby breaking up the pods and in part removing the seeds. From this first cylinder the clover passes into the separator, which takes the bulk of the coarser material from the un hulled pods and carries or rakes it to the rear, where it is removed from the machine by a carrier. The clover-pods and seeds that fall between the raker-bars of the separator arc pushed forward into the lower huller. The seed, unhulled pods, chaff, and finer stems discharged from the lower huller pass to a zinc stem-riddle, through whose holes the seed, pods, and finer stems drop, and are returned by the conveyer to the upper cylinder, to be again subjected to the action of the two cylinders, while the coarser stems are blown out with the chaff. The two woven-wire screens, one having five and the other eleven meshes to the inch, are fastened in a frame, which is driven by two pitmans (one on each side of the cleaner), connecting with a crank-shaft having on either side of the cleaner two cranks, to one of which, on each side, arc connected the pitmans operating the stein-riddle. Through a lower screen or sieve, of perforated zinc, the seed passes, and is separated from the coarser material not blown out by the fan. The seed from the sieve goes into a small elevator and is carried up to the seed-recleaner, which, fastened to the side of the machine, thor oughly cleans and discharges the seed into bttgs.
and the general adoption of thrashing machines combining separators the hand fanning-mill (pi. 6o,fig.6) is much less employed than formerly. It has of late years been so improved that it will clean grain of foul seeds and separate the larger from the smaller berries of the same kind of grain, thus enabling the farmer to select the largest and best for sowing. The separation of the varieties of seed is effected by a series of differently-meshed screens, through which the grain falls, while at the same time the chaff is blown out by a rotary fan. Fig ure 5 exhibits a four-hole self-feeding power corn-sheller.