Tim Chamen (as owner of this website) first became acquainted with gantry tractor systems when, as a young agricultural engineer in 1981, he was called upon to gaze into likely mechanisation changes in the 21st Century. In researching new ideas he looked back into the 19th Century where he came across the Halkett Steam Cultivator (featured on the History page). He was hooked and the rest, as they say, is history! He went on to run the gantry trials at SRI, Silsoe UK and was privileged to have frequent contact with David Dowler who designed and built a range of gantries for farm use.