The Hytrol Story

One of the products Tom and Hydro-Controls manufactured was lawn mower parts. These were mostly commercial, rotary lawn mowers with 36 and 42 inch wide cutting circles. These early lawn mowers were very heavy and used a belt and reducer. One day, Tom studied one of the commercial reducers that was being used on these lawn mowers and decided he could make them right there in his shop. He used that same Gisholt Turrent Lathe and produced a reducer that was all in one housing rather than the other type which had a horizontal joint at the shaft line of the output shaft. Then, he noticed something else. He discovered he could use that same, right-angle reducer on the conveyor and it would work perfectly to move the chain at just the right speed. Tom’s first conveyor used a chain and flights instead of a belt. He also designed it so it could be folded in half when not in use. Eventually, Tom completed the unit and Lester took it to his company and put it to work. Although the unit sometimes tore the bags, Lester never complained. He thought it was great! (Author’s note: The old Cambridge Feed & Seed building is now a restaurant. The area there is now an upscale, avant garde place with craft shops, antiques and pottery stores.) Not long after Lester began using that first Hydro-Controls conveyor, Tom began receiving inquiries from others in the seed, feed and grain handling business. They had seen Lester Jarlsberg’s conveyor and wanted Tom to build them a unit, too. Suddenly, Tom found himself manufacturing a product he had originally been reluctant to make! By 1948, Hydro-Controls was manufacturing a conveyor based on the first design, using chain and flights to move the bags. He made one smaller model, about ten feet long, and folded it in half so it would fit in his station wagon. He went out and marketed this conveyor himself, in a radius of some 50 to a 100 miles. At first, he was successful and sold about 35 of this model.