John Fowler (agricultural Engineer) - First Steam-driven Drainage Plough

First Steam-driven Drainage Plough

In his early career, Fowler had worked with steam engines and the logical progression was to apply this method of power to his drainage plough. This he did in 1852 when he designed a steam engine with a winch mounted in front of the smoke box and a rope running from it, round a pulley anchored at the far side of the field and back to the engine. The engine pulled itself across the field, dragging the mole plough behind it. The design was therefore similar to his first design for the horse-powered plough. The experiment was a failure because the steam engine proved to be too heavy to move easily over soft ground. However in the same year, on 21 October, Fowler was awarded patent number 480 for "Improvements in Machinery for draining land", believed to be one of the first patents for the use of steam power in agriculture.