Famous Australian Ideas and Innovations

You're going to be very surprised at some of the great inventions Australians have been responsible for...

Heck, Aussie are even responsible for turning dishwater and beer into electricity, AND running cars on nothing but water!

This page presents a variety of those for your perusal - please REFRESH to see a different selection of ten Aussie innovations.

To find out more, can I suggest you visit
The Power House Museum and Questacon

• In 1983, Australia II won the America's Cup in part due to the revolutionary winged keel designed by Ben Lexcen.
  
  
• Modems the size of a shoebox led the NetComm company to develop in 1985 the Smart Modem - a string of Australian-designed, faster and smaller modems with better features.
  
  
• The Sydney GPO had the world's first mechanised Letter Sorting Machine in 1930. It was developed by an engineer with the Postmaster General's Department.
  
  
• The original heart pacemaker was invented by a doctor in 1926 from the Sydney Crown Street Women's Hospital.
  
  
• The radio telescope in Parkes, NSW, received and relayed to the world pictures of the first moon landing in 1969
  
  
• The Pop Top Can idea of press-buttons on cans (where the button is hinged to the can) so it does not cause a litter problem, was developed by Sir Ian McLennan of BHP in 1973
  
  
• It wasn't the first Australian rotary clothesline with a winding mechanism which allowed the frame to be raised and lowered, but the Hills Clothes Hoist (developed by Lance Hill in Adelaide in 1945) was certainly the most successful.
  
  
• The first ultrasound scanner was built in 1961 at the ultrasonics institute in the Commonwealth Department of Health by George Kossoff and David Robinson.
  
  
• Interscan - an aircraft approach and landing guidance system using microwaves - was successfully tested at Tullamarine Airport, Melbourne in 1975
  
  
• The world's first Plastic Banknotes were invented in Australia in 1988. They last longer and are harder to counterfeit than paper money.
  
  

Hit REFRESH to reload the page to see another random selection of more Aussie ideas :)

Written by coais

About Stephen Spry

Stephen Spry is a freelance web designer and Internet publisher. He has been working online, full-time, since 1995 after an 18-year career as a high school Careers Adviser. Stephen operates several websites and web directories in a variety of niches. His main web design business can be found here » Come On Aussie.