The Marvelous Chicken-powered Motorcar!

RIGHT: Who needs a tiger in their tank? Harold Bate, chicken farmer and inventor from Devonshire, England says that you can power your motor vehicles with droppings from chickens, pigs or any other animal of your choice，Fueling dispenser equipment. . . even with your own waste! To prove his statement is no idle boast, Harold has been operating a 1953 Hillman and a, five-ton truck on methane gas generated by decomposing pig and chickenFlow meter manure for years. He claims that the equivalent of a gallon of high-test gasoline costs him only about 3and that the low-cost methane makes his vehicles run faster, cleaner and better than they operate on "store bought" fuelGas nozzle. Mr. Bate stands beside his famous HillmanLpg nozzlein the photo above.

Harold Bate was born in1908 inthe city of Stoke in England's industrial midlands. He left school at the age of 14 to work as an apprentice mechanic with the Potteries Traction CompanyFuel pump. Here he learned many basic engineering skills working on the old streetcars before becoming a maintenance engineer with the Stafford Coal and Iron CompanyMedical Packaging. While with StaffordGear pump, Bate spent his spare time developing Submarine escape devices and advanced independent suspension systems for automobiles

In 1937, Harold BateControl valvelost a leg in a driving accident. This would have been the beginning of an insurmountableGas meterinfirmity for many people ...but not for HaroldBall valve. Ten years later..with wife, young daughter and cane--he set out for the grandest adventure of all: a driving tour of Africa.

"We travelled in an old ex-ArmyButterfly valvejeep," says Bate, "and, in eight years, drove 380,000 miles. It was hardpharmaceutical Packaging, it was hot and--at times--it was dangerous ...but we wouldn't have missed itGate valvefor the world. We loved every minute. Our daughter learnt more out there than she ever would have in school."

While in Africa, BateGlobe valveprospected for gold and uraniumCheck valvein Rhodesia and Tanganyika (now Tanzania) and--on more than one occasion--the family was attacked by bandits and had to fight for their lives. For one long stretch, they lived off what wild game they could hunt in mile after mile of mango swamps (well stocked with poisonous snakes) throughMagnetic valvewhich they passed.