1922.] Agricultural Machinery Testing Stations. 919 



of the entrant. At any trial the manufacturer has the right to 

 be represented. 



The reports are comprehensive documents, which, to take as an 

 instance an individual trial of a tractor and plough, may extend 

 to some 40 octavo pages. In addition to more or less obvious 

 heads of information, such as draw-bar pull, brake tests, 

 adaptability of tractor for haulage and stationary work, the 

 report includes details as to behaviour, especially in steering 

 and turning, safety of the engine, number of interruptions with 

 their duration and cause, ease with which parts can be replaced, 

 and comparison, where possible, with a single furrow horse 

 plough. The practical ploughing trial was carried on for 

 14 days. The result of the brake tests are given in a table 

 accompanied by a graph showing consumption of fuel at the 

 various developed h.p. A short conclusion, in simple terms, 

 sums up the detailed report. 



The reports of comparative trials or trials in series are also 

 comprehensive and are the more illuminating in that each phase 

 of the trials is represented in tabular form showing the per- 

 formance of each implement. 



Trials are not merely conducted in the field. Many details 

 admit of, if they do not absolutely require, investigation in the 

 laboratory. Nor are all trials concluded when the machine, 

 whatever it is, has been returned to the owner. The value of 

 many implements of cultivation cannot be thoroughly tested 

 until the crops, sown on the ground which they have worked, 

 have been harvested, and it is interesting to note in this con- 

 nection a Swedish account of trials of subsoiling ploughs in 

 which comparative yields of the first crop taken (wheat) are 

 included in the final report. It can with justice be urged that 

 one cereal crop is not very adequate evidence on so debatable 

 a subject; an absolutely scientific test might be held to require 

 no less than a whole rotation : but the immediate point to be 

 noted is the principle which governs the inclusion of such data 

 at all in the report. 



Any one single testing station is not dependent solely on 

 itself. One of its duties is, as already explained, the collation 

 of data already obtained elsewhere and, as is shown later, there 

 is among the European stations a considerable amount of agree- 

 ment as to the lines on which such data should be recorded. 



Thus the merits and shortcomings of previous machines of 

 any given type can be fully ascertained, and accumulation of 

 experience from the past may obviate the need for fresh 



