Brian  Young’s

TASKER’S

CHAFF CUTTER

One of the latest models from Brian Young of the Guild of Model Wheelwrights is this fine prize winning 1:12 scale model of a chaff cutter made by William Tasker & Sons, photographed at the Midlands Model Engineering Exhibition. Chaff cutters were used widely up to the 1940s and the end of the use of horses in farming. A chaff cutter is simply a device for cutting straw or hay into small pieces before being mixed with other forage and fed to horses and cattle to aid the animal's digestion.

Taskers of Andover in Hampshire, made a variety of agricultural equipment including the Little Giant traction engine, popular with model engineers. Also shepherds mobile huts, which have now become objects of restoration.

This chaff cutter dates from 1874, as can be seen from the corner of the drawing.