Summary

The Sunshine Stripper Harvester is famous for combining in one machine the functions of the stripper and winnower. In one operation it could gather and thresh the ripe heads, separate the grain from the chaff and deliver the grain for bagging.

This 'Sunshine' stripper harvester is a Type 'A' model with 5-foot wide comb, serial no: 8193, made at the H. V. McKay's Sunshine Harvester Works, Ballarat, 1906.

Physical Description

List of Parts: Chain Link

Significance

A number of Australians were involved in the development of the stripper harvester. The most important was HV McKay who produced a successful machine in 1884 and subsequently manufactured large numbers as the "Sunshine" stripper harvester. The development of the stripper harvester increased the efficiency of cereal harvesting and helped to establish Australia as a leading cereal producing country.

The great drought of 1902 froze the demand for harvesters. With 200 machines and no crops to harvester or prospect of selling them, McKay was compelled to look outside Australia for an alternative market for his equipment and sent his brother Sam with 50 machines to Argentina. This was the start of a very successful export market that included South America, South Africa, Siberia and the United States. Until the First World War halted trade McKay sold over 10,000 harvesters to South American countries.

The innovative stripper harvester was the basis on which the McKay company became the largest agricultural manufacturing enterprise in the Southern Hemisphere.

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