History of Cletrac military vehicles

[David Pope]

I downloaded a few books off the net and came up with this short history of Cletrac's military vehicle program.
In 1938 the US Ordnance Dept and Marmon Harrington designed and built the T5 Light Tractor for airfield use. The design progressed through the T6 and T7 to the TA20 then the larger TA30. They even made several models of light tanks as they continued developing the track system.

[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

In 1940 Cletrac used the track developments made by Marmon Harrington to come up with the much larger and heavier MG1. This was further developed and accepted by the Army as the M2 High Speed Tractor for use as an airfield tractor.

[David Pope]

It was tested at Aberdeen as a Prime Mover for towing artillery pieces but this proved impractical. In tough going the MG1 would squat down onto the rear sprocket and just have a short piece of the track on the ground. This also lost most of the ground clearance and ended with the machine and gun getting stuck.

[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

The M2 was improved upon some more and produced by John Deere as well as Cletrac. It proved to be the ideal tractor for dealing with the large bombers near the end of the war and was used into the 1960s.

[David Pope]

The problems encountered in the Prime Mover tests led to the design of the MG2 with the drive sprocket at the front and the rear idler close to the ground.

[David Pope]

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[David Pope]

The MG2 was further developed and the Army designated it as the T10 Medium Tractor. 22 of the T10s were built.

[David Pope]

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