Editing Steamroller (section)

==History==
[[Image:Aveling and Porter Roller Britannia.JPG|thumb|[[Aveling and Porter]] manufactured the first successful steamrollers. Pictured is the model "Britannia".]]
Before about 1850, the word steamroller meant a fixed machine for rolling and curving steel plates for boilers and ships.
From then on, it also meant a mobile device for flattening ground.<ref>[http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12979627 Known in Australia in 1856]</ref>
An early steamroller was patented by Louis Lemoine in France in 1859 and demonstrated sometime before February 1861.<ref name=clark321>{{cite book |last=Clark |first=D. Kinnear |date=1890 |title=The Construction of Roads and Streets|publisher=Crosby Lockwood and Sons |page=321 }}</ref> In Britain, a 30-ton steamroller was designed in 1863 by [[William Clark (inventor)|William Clark]] and partner W.F. Batho.{{sfn|Ranieri|2005|pp=54-55}}<ref name=Proudfoot /> Having failed to impress the British municipal road authorities it was transferred  to [[Kolkata]] where it continued to work.<ref name=Proudfoot>{{cite journal |last1=Proudfoot |first1=David. C |date=1883|title=On Road rolling |journal=Transactions of the Royal Scottish Society of Arts |volume=10 |pages=579–586}}</ref>

The company [[Aveling and Porter]] was the first to successfully sell the product commercially and subsequently became the largest manufacturer in Britain.{{sfn|Ranieri|2005|pp=54-55}} In 1866 they produced a prototype roller with {{convert|3|ft|cm|-1|adj=mid|wide}} rollers fitted to the rear of a standard 12 [[nominal horsepower|nominal-horsepower]]-[[traction engine]]. This experimental machine was described by local papers as 'the world's first steamroller' and it caused a public spectacle.

In 1867, the steam road roller was patented and the company began production of the first practical steam roller – the new machine's rollers were mounted at the front instead of the back and it weighed in excess of 30 tons. It was tested on the Military Road in [[Chatham Dockyard|Chatham]], Star Hill in [[Rochester, Kent|Rochester]] and in [[Hyde Park, London|Hyde Park]], [[London]] and the machine proved a huge success. Within a year, they were being exported around the world, including to France, [[British Raj|India]] and the United States. A [[New York City]] chief engineer said of one of these, that "in one day's rolling at a cost of 10 dollars, as much work was accomplished as in two days' rolling with a 7 ton roller drawn by eight horses at a cost of 20 dollars a day."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.farmcollector.com/steam-traction/steam-rollers-in-britain.aspx|title=Steam Rollers in Britain|publisher=Farm Collector|date=May 1990}}</ref> The heavier rollers were found to be hard to handle and the weight of the machines was reduced to around 10 tons.{{sfn|Ranieri|2005|pp=54-55}}

Aveling and Porter refined their product continuously over the following decades, introducing fully steerable front rollers and [[compound steam engine]]s at the 1881 [[Royal Show|Royal Agricultural Show]]. The move to asphalt for road construction resulted in the demand for steamrollers that could rapidly reverse so they could roll the tar while still hot.{{sfn|Burton|2000|pp=117-118}} Machines that could do this were introduced in the first decade of the 20th century.{{sfn|Burton|2000|pp=117-118}}

Production ended around 1950.{{sfn|Burton|2000|p=119}}