486 Report on the Trials of Implements at Wolverhampton. 
of a short finger, entering into a small aperture in the block, slides the block 
for a short distance toward one drum or the other. The block is held in posi- 
tion by two rings, P P, which are fixed to the windlass-fi'ame. A jointed 
lever, Q, fastened upon the shaft, and carrying at its upper end the weight, R, is 
thrown sideways in the same direction as the clutches are moved ; and thus, 
M'hcn the drum, I, is in gear, the brake-block is urged with considerable 
jiressure against the side of the flange of the other drum, PI. The dotted lines 
show the position of the weight and jointed lever when the clutches are shifted 
so as to gear with the drum, H, and the partial turning of the shaft throws 
the jointed lever to the opposite side, pressing the block against the flange 
of the drum, 1. Messrs. Barrows and Stewart recommend that, in ordinary 
work, the engineman should work the windlass ; but the trial did not show 
the expediency of such an attempt at saving labour. 
On Wednesday, June 28th, the engine, windlass, and cultivator were 
moved from the former place in the depot-field to Plot 1, a distance of nearly 
half a mile, by eight horses, in 9^ minutes; the remainder of the apparatus 
being conveyed in a van in 7 minutes. Ten horses would be required for 
shifting the whole simultaneously. After reaching the field, the tackle was 
fixed in position and laid out ready for starting work in 50 minutes, 6 men 
and 4 horses being engaged. In work, the customary "roundabout" force 
was employed, — namely, 1 engine-man, 1 windlass-man, 1 implement-man, 
2 anchor-men, and 2 porter-boys ; or together, 5 men and 2 boys, not in- 
cluding the water-cart man. The engine, indicating a maximum force of 321 
horse-power, cultivated with the 5-tine implement at 7i inches depth an area 
of 3 acres in 2 hours 54 minutes, which is at the rate of 10 acres, 1 rood, and 
15 jiercbes in a day of 10 hours. The time occupied in turning the cultivator 
at the ends varied from 30 to 140 seconds, averaging 54 seconds ; and this 
absence of smartness about the hands had very much to do with the slow rate 
of performance. But the ground was unfavourable ; a very grassy piece with 
a deep and awkward hollow, and a few large stones were caught by the imple- 
ment. The maximum pace of the cultivator was 3? miles per hour, and 
hence the ground was not so well broken up as by some of the more rapidly 
moving apparatus tried in the same field ; and the tines ribbed the bottom in 
" scrows." The whole, however, was noted as " fair work ; uneven bottom." 
Plot 3, in Field No. XII. Messrs. John Fovjler and Co.'s DouUe-Emjine 
20-IIorse Set (Catalogue No., 6480) ; consisting of a pair of 20-horse self-moving 
engines, with single cylinders, fitted with single winding-drums, 800 yards of 
best steel-wire rope, and working a 13-tined turning cultivator (6497). Price, 
1975<!. ; with 6-furrow balance combined plough and digger (6488), in 
addition, 2070Z. The system of working an implement by two engines 
moving themselves at intervals and opposite to each other along two head- 
lands of a field, and alternately winding up and paying out the single ply of 
rope which hauls the implement to and fro, is so well known that it need not 
be described here in detail. Its advantages are the rapidity and ease with 
which the tackle is brought into the field and put to work, the absence of all 
detached gear, such as windlass, anchors, snatch-blocks, &c., the shortness of 
the wire-rope used, — which is a minimum, the rope out being merely the 
length of the field cultivated, — and the safety arising from the furrow ending 
always at that engine which is drawing the implement, where the engine- 
driver can see the implement arrive at the end of its journey, so that in foggy 
weather or with an intervening hill there is no difficulty about signals. In 
these engines the boiler is of the ordinary locomotive type, of sufficient power 
to supply steam abundantly at a pressure of 150 lbs. per square inch. The 
heating surface of the fire-box amounts to 44 square feet, of the tubes 234 
square feet, making a total heating surface of 278 square feet, and the fire- 
grate area is 91 square feet. _ 
