Rotary milking parlor

Rotolactor

Modern 2008 "rotary milking parlor" (Rotolactor), Großerkmannsdorf, Germany
Process type	Cow milking apparatus
Industrial sector(s)	Dairy
Main technologies or sub-processes	Milking a large number of cows
Product(s)	Rotary milking parlor
Main facilities	Walker-Gordon Laboratories dairy
Inventor	Henry W. Jeffers
Year of invention	1930
Developer(s)	Borden Company

The Rotolactor is the first invention for milking a large number of cows successively and largely automatically, using a rotating platform. It was developed by the Borden Company in 1930, and is known today in the dairy industry as the "rotary milking parlor".

The Rotolactor was the first invention for milking a large number of cows using a rotating platform. It was invented by Henry W. Jeffers. The Rotolactor was initially installed in a "lactorium," a building specifically designed for milking cows, in Plainsboro, New Jersey. The rotating mechanical milking machine was first used by the Walker-Gordon Laboratories dairy and was put into operation on November 13, 1930.

Jeffers conceived the idea for the Rotolactor in 1913 as a cost-cutting and labor-saving method for milking a large number of cows. Development of the project was put on hold during World War I. In 1928, the Walker-Gordon Laboratories dairy was purchased by the Borden Company, and Rotolactor development resumed in earnest. Borden provided $200,000 in 1929 for building the Rotolactor at the Walker-Gordon Laboratories dairy farm.

The first line of the Abstract of the 1930 Cow Milking Apparatus (Rotolactor) patent starts:

"The object of this invention is to provide an apparatus whereby an indefinitely large number of cows may be milked successively and largely automatically..."

The Rotolactor (roto + lactor ium) was a large rotating "merry-go-round" style platform for holding 50 cows. The machine brought the cows into position for milking with automatic milking machines. The rotating platform machine was sixty feet in diameter and made one complete revolution about every twelve and a half minutes, which was the time required to prepare and milk each cow.

The first step for each new cow was receiving a bath. They were bathed with warm water and automatic showers, supplemented by two men using pressure hoses, who "devote their attention to the cleansing of udders and flanks."

The next operator prepared the udder for milking. Then the teat-cups of the automatic milking machine were attached to the cow's udder. The cow was then milked for the twelve and a half minutes during the Rotolactor's one-time complete rotation. The teat-cups would then be detached at the end of the twelve and a half minute rotation. The cow would then step off the platform and return to the barn to her stall.