Just reading a new book called Willunga Almonds, Stories and recipes... it says that Charles Ragless also developed a machine to crack almonds. Apparently it was too expensive to import machinery for this from California, so (typical Aussie initiative) Ragless made his own and used it not only to crack his own almonds but also those on the surrounding farms.

Thanks for that, is there no end to Aussie ingenuity :)