BEET HARVESTER.

Te Aroha News, Volume XII, Issue 1793, 11 December 1895, Page 2

BEET HARVESTER.

Beetroot sugar machinery,, including mechanism’for the preparatory operations of washing, rasping, and pressing the ropts, as well as for every subsequent stage, is already in. existence and use. So also, is beet harvesting machinery, intended for the removal of the roots from the ground! But in this last department there has hitherto been room for much improvement. The increasing attention that is being paid to beet culture upon the .European Continent andin other countries justifies —nay, necessitates—strenuous exertions on the part, of inventors and manufacturers to put before agriculturists mechanism that shall more economically and readily garner the crop than can at present be expected bym&nuaHabour. It is not enough,/ as some machines do, to pull the roots only half out of the ground, for manual labour has- then: to be employed to complete the operation, and to be paid for. at almost the. same rate as ifentrusted with the roots’ complete removal. Moreover, hitherto 1 , existing mechanism has let the tops iritact, and these, of course, have to be afterwards taken off as a separate operation) thereby entailing additional expense and further time. From what we have stated it will be seen that there has been plenty of room for, improvement in implements and machinery for lifting, beet. The new boot harvester recently mentioned anthese columns is the invention of a Belgian farmer. The machine’s construction is of a very unique'kind, and comprise a number of discs. These discs are eight indies, apart at the back, and twenty-four inches distant at the front. The move-, brent of the horses cause- the discs to revolve, and the beet is thereby lifted out of, the ground. As it passes the lever the top of the root is /cut off .by the knife. According to the condition and size of the beets, and the consequent height of the: tops, the portion removed can be easily regulated by a screw and spring. These adjust the lever, so that the cut can be made j ust at the required spot. As the ..beet, now beheaded, travels up it passes against two Tollers at the./end' of. the the lever. These remove any adhering earth from the root, and then allow it to drop out at the end of the machine. The long tap roots possessed by most varieties of beetrender its removal from - the ground without damage a matter requiring almost as much cage as the extraction of a tooth by-a dentist.. Immunity from injury is an important feature, of the machine, fortho ..commercial value of the root it handles is; we are assured, unimpared.. Another, great recommendation is its lightness of draught.- ; J Only - two ! - horse's were required to draw it during a recent .ten days’ trial in various soilsjin Saxony. Here it gave the best possible results. It is claimed that this is the only machine that; both; extracts the roots’ entirely from the: soil and also cuts off the tops,—Town and Country Journal.