358 



Lincoln Tractor Trials, 1920. 



[July, 



THE 1920 LINCOLN TRACTOR TRIALS.- 



Thompson Close, B. J. Owen, B.Sc. (Eng.), and 

 H. G. Richardson, M.A., B.Sc. 



It is to be regretted that the report of the judges of the 

 Lincoln Tractor Trials of 1920! should not have been published 

 until some six months after the event, and that now that it 

 is finally given to the public the report should contain so few 

 details of the performances of the machines taking part. We 

 may recall that the conditions governing the trials conducted 

 by the Royal Agricultural Society were drawn up under the 

 influence of a principle the reverse of that which had been 

 adopted by the Society of IMotor Manufacturers and Traders 

 in the previous year. At the earlier trials the performance 

 of each machine had been recorded, there had been no prizes 

 or awards, and those interested had been left to draw their 

 own conclusions. 



The R.A.S.E. determined to follow an old practice and a^Yard 

 prizes. The awards were announced at the conclusion of the 

 trials, but it was expected that the basis of the awards would 

 in due course be disclosed in the form of a record of the 

 individual performances of the competing machines. We have 

 previously expressed our grave doubts as to the wisdom of 

 awarding prizes or instituting an order of merit in such 

 cases, and we venture to think that the present report will 

 not convert anyone to a belief in the value of prizes. We 

 may go further and assert that the public interested in agricul- 

 tural tractors have a moral right to be furnished with the 

 recorded performances of tractors competing in public trials. 

 Apart from the importance to farmers and manufacturers 

 of knowing exactly the considerations which influenced the 

 judges in av/arding a prize, it should be possible for anyone to 

 compare the actual performances of each tractor and further 

 to compare the year's records with those of preceding years. 



The only details of performance disclosed are contained in 

 Table III under the heads of: — 



Time in hours per acre. 



Fuel in gallons per acre. 



Wages in pence per acre. 



Fuel cost in pence per acre. 



* In continuation of " Notes on the Lincoln Tractor Trials, 1920," Journal, 

 Nov., 1920, p. 714. 



f Published by the Royal Agricultural Society of England, price 7s. 6d. 



