Combine Harvesters: Books - History and Models (2/2)

Histoire des batteuses de nos campagnes

Thresher, beater, battery: depending on the region, it changed its name and its servants were called "the beaters". The images disappear, but the memories remain. Let's hurry, because the storytellers of memories will also disappear in turn, and there will only be a few yellowed photos and a few machines and documents left in some collectors or museums, or even in some enthusiasts!

This book offers you an overview of the history of the different types of threshers in France, from the first threshing machines of the 18th century to the Trente Glorieuses.

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A la découverte des moissonneuses batteuses 1920-1990 (Tome 1)

Cereals have always been a staple of human nutrition. Man has sought to harvest these cereals as efficiently as possible, throughout the world: by hand, with a sickle or with a scythe. The equipment used for harvesting was then pushed or pulled by animals and the first modern harvesters date from 1831. They were designed by Mc Cormick.

In 1870, the first harvester-binders appeared, initially with wire binding, then with twine in the 10 years following this innovation and until 1960. At that time, on small farms, green mowers with cereal equipment and crop cultivators were used until the early 1950s.

While the first combine harvesters (with cuts of 6 m and more, driven by steam or oil engines, pulled by animals (30 to 40 horses or mules!) were operating before 1900, in the 1980s to 2000s, we saw the advent of machines with cuts of 3.60 m to 7.20 m and with powers of up to 300 horsepower.
And in this field, it seems that nothing can stop progress. Today, 700 horsepower machines are built that can harvest over 13.80 meters!

Bernard Gibert, thanks to his rare and precious period documents, continues his ambition to retrace the entire history of the mechanization of modern agriculture. So discover with us aboard these legendary combine harvesters!

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Les Moissonneuses Batteuses (2ème édition)

Combine harvesters have revolutionized the agricultural world! What were the inventions that allowed farmers to improve the quality of their work and make it less arduous? And how did they arrive on farms?

Relive, by turning the pages of this beautiful book, this incredible industrial and agricultural adventure, thanks to magnificent archive photos of men and their machines but also thanks to technical explanations to understand.
On the occasion of this revised and corrected edition which has become a reference for enthusiasts, the author has updated his text and added some details to the captions of the photos he has selected to tell in pictures the epic of the combine harvester in France.

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A la découverte des moissonneuses batteuses 1920-1990 (Tome 2)

While the first combine harvesters (with cuts of 6 m and more, driven by steam or oil engines, pulled by animals (30 to 40 horses or mules!) were operating before 1900, in the 1980s to 2000s, we saw the advent of machines with cuts of 3.60 m to 7.20 m and with powers of up to 300 horsepower!
And in this area, it seems that nothing can stop progress. Today, 700 horsepower machines are being built that can harvest over 13.80 meters!

Bernard Gibert, thanks to his rare and precious period documents, continues his ambition to retrace the entire history of the mechanization of modern agriculture with 20 new brands.
So discover with us aboard these legendary combine harvesters!

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A la découverte des moissonneuses-batteuses 1920-1990 (tome 3)

For this final volume of the series on "combine harvesters from 1920 to 1990", you will discover brands and models known because they were used in France. But you will also discover other brands and other models, never marketed in our country but whose advertising documents had nevertheless been published in our language without meeting with success among farmers.
These are 50 new brands that will complete the collection of the first two volumes.

Today, it is no longer possible to produce works presenting so many models because only a few brands share the world market, the best known of which are: John Deere with all sorts of models, Case with its Axial Flow, New Holland with its CR, Massey-Ferguson with its Ideal, its brand new machine.

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Moissonneuses batteuses françaises 1905-1985

The transition from traditional harvesting to combine harvesting took place in France in two decades, while it had taken four times as long in North America. Thus, a hundred years passed between Hiram Moore's first tests and the launch of the first Guillotin.

This is a very strange observation that illustrates the gap. Could French manufacturers, admittedly hampered by two long conflicts, have taken better advantage of the experience acquired across the Atlantic? Nothing is less certain because neither the structure of the farms, nor the nature of the harvests, nor the general organization of the collection and storage chain were comparable on both sides of the ocean.
A combine harvester suitable for French needs was therefore redesigned in design offices, sometimes headed by men of genius, but which until then followed unsuitable manufacturing methods.

Thanks to this exceptional work of 192 pages illustrated with nearly 400 photos, drawings and functional sections, find the different combine harvesters produced in France.
Numerous technical sheets allow you to identify the different models, date them, understand how they work and recognize their specific features.

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