Totemobile Speeds Betting at Makaraka

"Ten bob each way, please"......Down goes a knob and out pop the tickets, quicker than you can say Makaraka. That's the way they do things now at the P.B. Turf Club's race Meetings. A mechanical Barrel called a Totemobile has converted the task of stamping tickets & recording bets into a high-speed, precision operation. An array of gadgets in the Totemobile, shown below as engineer Dick Lacey makes adjustments, is the nerve centre.

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Punters at Makaraka queue up to place their bets

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Forty-four portable machines, made in Australia, can each produce tickets at the rate of 90 a minute. All the operator has to do is swivel a pointer to the number of the horse and press a button. The ticket, automatically printed, pops up through a slot.

Wires—10 miles of them —connect the machines to the Totemobile. Electrical impulses record each bet...win, place or double.

At right Jack Sherson, a technician, is pictured at a "test run" showing a tote assistant how to use a ticket-printer.

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An investor buying her tickets

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Tote assistants learning the new system

Computing odds is a matter of seconds with the equipment at their fingertips.

Machinery within the Totemobile itself is valued at £30,000.

This equipment, dismantled after each meeting, is hired by clubs throughout the North Island. It will operate at a total of 76 meetings this year.

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Steve Wills (foreground) & Fred Swindell are shown above inside the Totemobile.
Steve checks the volume of bets on Individual horses; Fred is busy with the doubles.

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They send on the information by telephone to Syd Clarke & Frank Goodacre, shown right adjusting the tote board.
The figures outside give punters a continual check on the state of the betting.

They had to chip away a 3in. concrete bench and build a new wooden bench for the ticket—printers, which fit snugly in place.

New Zealand manager of the company is Jack Waters pictured right (in centre of group), explaining how the system operates.

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Gisborne carpenter Allen McColl spent eight weeks with the help of George Crawford preparing the tote building for the machinery.

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Above right, Turf Club president Henry Dods chats with tote assistants during a test run which proved the speed & accuracy of the new system.
Ability to start races immediately tote is closed is one big advantage.

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Jack White (club's acting secretary), Merl Beuth (tote manager), Henry Dods. Harry Lunn (steward), Jack Waters and Bill Zahner (company's chief engineer)

Punters as well as officials praised the smooth working of the Totemobile system.
Waiting in queues for tickets was reduced to a minimum as the machines clicked over.

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A section of the crowd pictured on the first day of the autumn meeting.

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Two horses clear a brush together in the Steeplechase Handicap.
The heavy track made it a day for outsiders.

Pictured below are the rolls of paper which fit into the ticket-printers.

Cutting the rolls into ticket lengths is just one of the versatile machines' jobs.

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Lucky punters collect their dividends

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An exterior view of the Totemobile parked at the back of the tote building. Wiring in the building is permanent. Plugging in the mobile equipment will be a simple matter on the van's future visits.

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These rolls of paper....

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....make these tickets.