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CHAPTER X

HOW TO TEACH FARM MECHANICS, ENGINEERING, AND SHOP WORK

"The specific aim of the work in farm engineering is to prepare young people so to plan, locate, construct, and maintain farm buildings, fences, roads, and drainage (or irrigation) systems; and so to select, operate, and maintain farm machinery and mechanical equipment as to contribute most highly to the profit and pleasure of farming."-Report of Committee on Agriculture of the N. E. A. Commission on Reorganization of Secondary Education.

EVERY farmer must from the very nature of his business be a mechanic. It is self-evident that he ought to be a good mechanic. The interest which most students naturally have in mechanical things shows that they can be trained readily and successfully to be good mechanics. High schools and colleges offering general courses in farm mechanics do well to place these courses in the early years of the training.

course.

Content of the Course. The whole realm of farm engineering, farm mechanics, and farm shop work may be included in this Most of the exercises included in such a course are in themselves nonproductive. They are rather a means to an end. They are involved in productive projects with both animals and plants. In the broadest sense this course should include the study of farm machinery, farm motors, farm buildings, rural sanitation, road construction and maintenance, simple blacksmithing, pipe fitting, rope work, land measurement, terracing, leveling practice, drainage and irrigation.

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Special Methods in Teaching the Subjects. In the long courses in high schools and in college courses, principles as well as practice should be so well taught that the students are able to adapt methods to new conditions. After such a course, it should not be necessary for students to work by "rule of thumb.’ They should understand how to adapt the principles to their own home conditions and projects. For example, when the matter of farm power is being taught, the principles of working problems in belting, pulleys, speed, and power should be well understood.

When rafters for building are being cut, the methods of cutting under all ordinary conditions should be learned instead of following patterns.

In road construction the principles of drainage, foundations,

and wearing surfaces should be well understood. Do not merely learn how to operate in one particular case. In building concrete floors for barns the conditions which will prevent the accumulation of moisture under all circumstances should be learned. Do not conclude that one example will suffice under all conditions.

When studying the repair and adjustment of farm machinery, the principles of transmission and their application in complex machinery should be well understood (Fig. 93). When farm motors

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FIG. 83.-A farm shop-room showing very good equipment. (L. A. Henke.)
FIG. 84.-Iowa students making racks for drying seed corn.

(Fonda School.)

are being studied, the principles of the gasoline engine should be so well understood that the student can as easily repair one common form as another.

Equipment for Farm Shop Work.-Schools offering courses in farm shop work should have a lighted room with sufficient heat to allow the work to be carried on even in severe winter weather. There should be simple wood-working benches with vises (Figs. 83 and 84).

There should be a few good carpentry tools, including cross-cut hand saws, rip saws, and perhaps a large wood saw, hammers, chisels of one or two widths, braces and set of bits for wood, a jackplane, miter-box, framing-square, tri-square, hatchet, drawingknife, spoke-shave.

For metal working, one forge and a heavy anvil should usually be provided in the school shop. The necessary forge tools should include tongs, shovel, poker. Anvil tools should include a hardie,

EQUIPMENT FOR TEACHING FARM POWER WORK 207

one or two types of hammers, cold-chisel. On the wall should be placed a press-drill provided with a set of bits. On the blacksmith bench there should be a good machinist's vise with pipe jaw and anvil back. Have sets of taps and dies. There should be supplies of bolts of several types and sizes. Square, round, and flat steel bars should be ready for use in repair of machinery.

For soldering and tinning, have simple and inexpensive outfits. For pipe fitting, a die stock and set of several sizes of dies,

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FIG. 85.-Students being taught to clean, oil, and repair farm harness. (H. N. Loomis, Mass.) pipe cutter, pipe wrenches, and supplies of fittings and pipe of such sizes as will be used in various exercises.

For harness repair work, have leather punches, supplies of rivets, sewing clamps, needles, awls, wax, and thread. Provide supplies of snaps, buckles, and other harness hardware of the common sizes.

Equipment for Teaching Farm Power Work-If possible, provide an old gasoline engine which can be used to take apart, put together, and adjust until all parts are well understood. A gasoline engine should be belted to a countershaft which is belted to various machines for different farm purposes. These may be for sawing wood, pumping water, grinding tools, grinding grain, lighting, etc.

If convenient, have a windmill for the study of its principles and methods of management. This may be omitted in regions where windmills are not used. Besides the common gasoline engine, a gas tractor should be provided if possible. This may be borrowed when it is not possible to own one.

A steam-boiler and steam-engine may be of service in teaching the principles of their operation. Such equipment would be most valuable in regions where such machines are to be used, as in dairying. Have in the shed outside the shop, farm machinery which is available for repair work, the study of adjustments, the replacement of parts, and the measurement of power.

Class Work in Farm Mechanics. Most of the class instruction should be with the mechanical devices themselves. Demonstrations in testing the power of engines is an example of good material for class instruction.

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FIG. 86. Teach students to make rope halters, different kinds of knots and splices. (L. A. Henke.)

When a class is to be given a laboratory exercise in mending harness (Fig. 85), a demonstration in the methods of doing this with proper explanation and discussion by members of the class should precede the laboratory work. Similar instructions should precede laboratory work in pipe fitting, soldering, tempering, framing buildings, making concrete, and installing watering systems, or lighting systems.

Let all the class work precede or follow the practice and laboratory work. When general principles are to be taught to long course students, these principles may be stated and worked out by members of the class just before or just after the work with these materials (Fig. 86).

Reviews and quizzes upon lessons learned in the actual work in the practicums and laboratory exercises should be given from time

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to time. Such reviews will lead the students into habits of keeping their minds upon their work. Students that do not keep their minds upon their problems while at work will soon find they are missing much that other students are gaining.

Oiling Pad

FIG. 87.-A few have combined the hog oiler and self-feeder in their pig project work. Every pig is thus oiled at little expense and trouble. The oiled pad is placed where it will rub their ears, head, and neck when they are eating. (After A. W. Turner in Wallace's Farmer.)

Farm Mechanics and Shop Work. If students pursuing the course are all from farms or are conducting farm projects, the first and most important lines of shop work should be made up of those

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FIG. 88.-Floor plan of individual workshop for a boy's home shop. (U. S. D. A.) problems with which the individual members of the class are directly concerned. If one or more members of the class are conducting a poultry project and are in need of simple poultry houses such as movable colony houses, they should be taught to construct these, and may do this either at the school during laboratory periods or at their homes as part of their project work. If desired,

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