PART THREE – Amplion Mower with Reilax Sprayer The first studio photograph depicts the Amplion mower with sprayer accessory taken from the left-hand front.
This is a side discharge alloy base mower with a shallow skirt. Note that his mower has a primitive 4-point height adjuster. Each wheel had to be adjusted manually for height and there appears to be three set height choices.
The engine is an Australian 125cc Hurricane [without shroud cooling], and the fuel tank is mounted on a folding handle bar.
The wheels are of the new rubber with nylon bush type made by Walter Barr [see Related Reading].
The accessory – a Reilax sprayer gun – was powered by a gearbox and compressor located on a platform mounted to the front chassis. Note the two large ½” Whitworth butterfly nuts that secure it.
Reilax was the brand name of equipment manufactured by North Sydney’s JW Earnshaw Pty Ltd. Earnshaw made the gearbox/compressor unit and the spray gun and these had been advertised by them since the early 1950s [see gallery].
I include an ad for the Amplion being sold in 1959. Apart from the folding handle and engine, it bears no similarity to the mower shown here. Do you think this is a prototype that never entered production?
