THATCHING RECORD

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 5, Issue 99, 2 September 1942, Page 5

THATCHING RECORD

NOVEL BRITISH MACHINE MAKES , MILE OF RICK MATTING A DAY An invention patented in 1896 but stillborn because it was before its " time has been produced in a modernised power-driven version to help on Britain's agricultural front. It is a thatch-making machine which enables ricks to be covered at half the- cost and one-fifth the man-hours of the old method and is | being made in hundreds for Bri- | tain's next, harvest. Straw fed into 'the machine is' stitched into a continuous mat,. V which is then cut into convenient ? lengths generally of 9ft or 12ft. The., manufacturing cost is about a yard (with wheatened straw at £4 10s a ton) and the production rate is from 2 yards'a minute, although, one farmer claims that he can make a mile in a day. The job can done at any time of the year antt'.H the matting stored in rolls until re- H quired. County Agricultural Committees are finding that, the machines solved many of Britain s wartime lems. Unskilled 'labour can be either on the larm or, in the mit tee's central. depots, lengths of matting can bi& made distributed J»i;o farms in the Ricks can be thatched they are built, for are nd to fall out and tho normal only pulls the stitches tighter, savM ing the use of ylck covers and ing the risk of weather I While the rick is settling the is completely gale proof,.