Can anyone identify this tractor?

[Svctech]

I met a guy today that had a partially restored tractor on a trailer. We believe it is a former military piece. It has a Hercules engine.
Thanks for your assistance.

Please reply to svctech@hotmail.com

 

[bullbreaker]

I met a guy today that had a partially restored tractor on a trailer. We believe it is a former military piece. It has a Hercules engine.
Thanks for your assistance.Please reply to svctech@hotmail.com

Not sure of the model # but I believe that peice of equipment was made by "Cletrac" which I think after they folded was briefly taken over by Oliver.

Boone

 

[bcp]

Do a Google image search for:

airborne bulldozer

Lots of similar sized ones show up.

Bruce

 

[BeezFun]

Do a Google image search for:

airborne bulldozer

Lots of similar sized ones show up.

More impressively, they show up being loaded into GLIDERS! Even after seeing the picture I still can't believe that even the military could dream up a reason to fly a bulldozer in a glider. If the enemy would have heard the airplane, won't they hear the diesel engine on the bulldozer? Two generals were probably drinking one night and one said it couldn't be done, so the other one spent $10M to prove him wrong.

 

[woodlandfarms]

Once the gliders landed on the ground is when the noise starts. The noise first heard was to be gunfire. Dozers would star up and start knocking down hedgrows allowing ground troops quick movement. On paper a great plan based on a silent ingress.

Sadly the gliders turned out to be a fatal error in judgement by the war department. Various reasons caused most of the gliders to crash and kill it's occupants. Army dropped the method pretty much right after d day.

Carl

 

[USNative]

Nice old tractor. Is this a project you are going to be working on?

 

[BeezFun]

Once the gliders landed on the ground is when the noise starts. The noise first heard was to be gunfire. Dozers would star up and start knocking down hedgrows allowing ground troops quick movement. On paper a great plan based on a silent ingress.

Sadly the gliders turned out to be a fatal error in judgement by the war department. Various reasons caused most of the gliders to crash and kill it's occupants. Army dropped the method pretty much right after d day.

Carl

Fascinating military history. So the life expectancy of a bulldozer operator was about 3 microseconds since he's the first one to face enemy. I would have expected some kind of shielding on the thing, or at least a drawer for clean underwear.

 

[cdaigle430]

More impressively, they show up being loaded into GLIDERS! Even after seeing the picture I still can't believe that even the military could dream up a reason to fly a bulldozer in a glider. If the enemy would have heard the airplane, won't they hear the diesel engine on the bulldozer? Two generals were probably drinking one night and one said it couldn't be done, so the other one spent $10M to prove him wrong.

They were used to make makeshift runways behind enemy lines. The gliders would sneak in in the cover of night behinf the front line just far enough away so they couldnt hear the dozer. Then they would starting clearing a path so more glider with troops could land in and deliver troops and supplies.

It was a good plan-risky and dangerous though.

 

[BeezFun]

They were used to make makeshift runways behind enemy lines. The gliders would sneak in in the cover of night behinf the front line just far enough away so they couldnt hear the dozer. Then they would starting clearing a path so more glider with troops could land in and deliver troops and supplies.

How can they be behind enemy lines and not have the enemy hear bulldozers clearing a runway? Isn't the definition of "enemy line" the line where you know the enemy is behind....

 

[crbr]

A nice looking machine.