A new lightweight, battery powered handpiece developed by Scottish engineering firm 4C is currently being trialled in Australia to use in the shearing industry.
AWI shearer trainer Elliott Learmonth has had the chance to give some sheep a few blows with the new aluminium handpiece at the Dubbo TAFE rural school and environment centre, and the results were hopeful.
"It was lighter and a lot thinner," Mr Learmonth said
"I could feel the skin on the sheep a lot more and I had a lot more manoeuvrability with it because it was smaller.
"But it might be just a little too short in the barrel, it would only be a centimetre in it to make it right."
The handpiece comes with a belt made out of wetsuit like material with a battery pack attached.
Mr Learmonth said once he had the belt on he didn't even know it was there.
"And there is heaps of power - it lasted for two hours," he said.
But he said one of the problems he noticed was the placement of the motor which affected the position of the downtube.
"The downtube was a bit long for me. So once I got into the long blow the downtube was laying on the sheep and it wasn't allowing me to move freely through there," he said.
"But I was able to make running adjustments.
"I also turned the belt upside down because the on/off switch was on my left, but for a shearer, when we finish our sheep we reach with our left arm to our right side of the body to pull the cord, so as soon as I finished a sheep and went to do that, there is no cord there.
"Once I turned the belt upside down, the switch was on the right side and my motor was on my left. And when I finished the sheep, I'd just reach over and hit my button - it's just a natural thing for a shearer."
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He said the different construction makes it easier to to hold, and the thinner barrel sits easily in the palm of the hand.
The next part of the project is to integrate sensors for letting the user know if the power is running low or the level of tension.
Those sensors, Mr Learmonth said, will be incredibly useful additions, especially for learner shearers.
"When I was learning I had no idea if I had enough tension - it takes years in the industry to work these sorts of things out," he said.
"So to have this sort of technology here telling you what is going wrong - it is going to help a lot and get learner shearers moving forward a lot quicker.
"Half the problem for a learner is often nothing works for them - getting something that works for them may just keep them in the industry - allowing them get over that 'pinch point' to keep shearing."
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