CANADIAN NOTES
The American - Abell Machinery
September/October 1951
H. S. Turner,
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American-Abell rear mount ploughing engine 28 hp single
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Goderich, Ontario, Can.
In 1902 the Advance Thresher Company and the Minneapolis
Threshing Machine Company jointly purchased the John Abell plant
in. Toronto, Ontario, and renamed it the American-Abell Engine and
Thresher Company Limited Although American owned the new company
immediately adopted the policy of 'Canadian-made goods for
Canadian users' and continued without interruption to build the
threshing machinery formerly manufactured by the John Abell Engine
and Machine Works Company.
John Abell's 'Toronto Advance' separator had been
well received in Western Canada and was improved by the addition of
the Maple bay wind stacker with wooden chute followed by the
Cyclone sear driven blower with metal pipe and the Parsons
self-feeder. In the. East, where all kinds of grain are grown, it
was not so popular, so, in the late 1890's John Abell designed
a new separator for Ontario. This machine featured a revolving'
grain carrier instead of the oscillating grain deck and had the
straw decks made in four sections which were hung on pivots at the
outer ends and given a nicely balanced motion by a center crank
shaft connected to the inner ends.
About this time the press was featuring the exploit of Lance
Corporal Find later of the Gordon Highlanders who won the Victoria
Cross at the assault on the Dargai Hill in Northern India, on
October 20th. 1897 where, shot through both leg's, he sat
through the hail to bullets and continued to cheer his hard pressed
comrades with the stirring tune 'Cock O' the North' on
his bagpipes. John Abell was impressed and named his new separator
The 'Cock O' The North' and incorporated the story and
illustrations of the epic feat in his catalogue. The American-Abell
firm went further by adopting a game rooster on a stump as their
Trade Mark and calling tilt if output the 'Cock o' the
North' line. The American- Abell engines had the figure of a
rooster cast in the smoke box dour.
For a few years the new owners continued to build the
'Toronto Advance' and the 'Cock o' the North'
separators and a full line of American-Abell 'Advance' and
'Compound' portable and traction engines. The simplest
engines had a spring mounting similar to the U. S. built
'Advance ' of the same period and were equipped with the
Marsh reverse gear and double-ported balanced valve. For the
western trade the simple engines were built in the 14, 16, 18, 22
and 26 hp. sizes and the cross-compounds 22 and 28 hp. and were
mounted on John Abell Patent End-Fed Straw Burning Boilers. Two
feet and a half of the flues extended back into the firebox of
these boiler giving the engines, especially the compounds, a short
stubby appearance. Those in the smaller sizes built for the east
had regular wood-burning fireboxes and diamond top smoke stacks and
looked better proportioned.
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