The Hydrostatic combine harvester, or simply combine, is a machine that harvests, threshes, and cleans grain plants. The desired result is the seed (such as canola or flax) or grain (such as oats, wheat, or rye); a byproduct is loose straw, the remaining husk of the plant with all nutrients removed. The combine was patented in 1834 by Hiram Moore, the same year as Cyrus McCormick was granted a patent on the mechanical reaper.
Early combines, some of them quite large, were drawn by horse or mule teams and used a bull wheel to provide mechanical power. Tractor-drawn, PTO-powered combines were used for a time. These combines used a shaker to separate the grain from the chaff and straw-walkers (grates with small teeth on an excentric shaft)to eject the straw while retaining the grain. Tractor drawn combines evolved to have separate gas or diesel engines to power the grain separation. Today's combines are self-propelled and use diesel engines for power. A significant advance in the design of combines was the rotary design. Straw and grain were separated by use of a powerful fan. Rotary combines were introduced in the late 1970's. About this time on-board electronics were introduced to measure threshing efficiency. This new instrumentation allowed operators to get better grain yields by optimizing ground speed and other operating parameters.
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