THE IEEIGATION AGE. 



563 



TURNS WASTE INTO WEALTH. 



Modern System of Digging Ditches Most Powerful Factor 

 in Watering Waste Land and Draining Swamps. 



"THE slow and painful method of making drainage and 

 irrigation ditches by spade and plow is a thing of the 

 past. Today great machines, propelled by steam, gasoline 

 or other power are opening up ditches to any width or 

 depth desired, leaving the sides clean, sloped at proper 

 angles and in every way a thing of usefulness and beauty. 

 These machines are plowing their way through the swamps 

 of the east to make arable useless wet lands and are 

 opening up the desert lands of the west for irrigation pur- 

 poses, and thus are mighty factors in the development of 

 our agriculture. 



The scientific principle of ditch building is that a 

 ditch is perfectly made only when it is cut true to grade, 

 the banks sloped to any desired angle and with bottom and 

 banks left as firm as nature made them. The waste banks 



irrigation ditches at a cost per cubic yard cheaper than 

 they can be dredged, but this is only one factor of the 

 problem. This machine digs the ditch complete with slop- 

 ing sides in one operation and a dredge does not. 



There must, therefore, be added to the cubic yard of 

 cost of dredge work the additional cost of trimming and 

 sloping these sides. Other important features of this ma- 

 chine and its work are: 



There is a gain in the life of the ditch, since the slop- 

 ing banks do not cave or easily wash. 



There is a gain in the water carrying capacity of the 

 ditch which enables a correspondingly smaller sized ditch 

 to do the work required. 



Then there is the very important gain of being able 

 to dig the ditch from mouth toward source and thus drain 

 the land along the lower stretches for immediate cultiva- 

 tion while the upper stretches of the ditch are being dug. 



The Austin Drainage Excavator constructs a per- 

 manent ditch which keeps its shape, at a lower initial ex- 

 pense than it can be built for by any other method. 



Rear view of Type "A" Machine digging ditch with 18-foot bottom, motive power gasoline engine. 



The units or panels making up the platform traction are so connected that they "bridge" that is, the load on each pair of wheels is 

 distributed over a multiplicity of panels or units, instead of only one. 'ITiis holds true for whatever position the wheels take. As a result, the 

 Austin Rolling Platform Traction will carry a machine over very soft ground almost any ground that does not require a boat. 



must also be placed at a sufficient distance from the ditch 

 to prevent caving. 



The most notable development in ditching machinery 

 is that made by the F. C. Austin Drainage Excavator 

 Company of Chicago. Each of the machines manufactured 

 by this company has features that fit it particularly for 

 its work. They have all been tried out in the ditch and on 

 the levee and are now successfully working in large num- 

 bers. 



The Austin machines are made especially with one or 

 two exceptions for drainage and excavation work and for 

 such work the manufacturers claim they have no equal in 

 this country. 



There is something besides mere digging in ditching 

 economics, and this is a fact to be remembered when a 

 machine is offered at what appears to be an astonishing 

 low price. An Austin Drainage Excavator will excavate 



When an irregular channel is once created the ten- 

 dency of flowing water is to increase the irregularity by 

 undermining the banks and forming bars in the channels, 

 thus choking the entire waterway by the deposit of silt. 

 The cost of maintaining such a ditch will exceed in a 

 short time the original cost of construction, and this is a 

 feature which must always be considered in the construc- 

 tion of ditches. 



The bottom of the ditch must be true to grade and 

 free from roughness. The size of the ditch must be true 

 and smooth and sloped back from the bottom at an angle 

 flat enough to prevent the earth from falling, caving or 

 slipping. 



The earth below the true planes of the bottom and 

 sides must be left undisturbed and as nature made it. 

 (Continued on page 565.) 



