Armoured Dozer
 

I have just found a great picture of "Slippery Sue" a Canadian Armoured dozer.
It is on British Pathe film ID 2145.01 frame 189 and on.
The AoS is 344 with an Army Group diagonal b/ left to t/ right.
According to "British Miltary Markings 1939-1945" that AoS should have the bar below. Is this another book error?
Can anyone make out the WD serial. I have last 4 numbers as 1007.

Cheers
Kevin
:salute:

"Slippery Sue" should be from 1 Mechanized Equipment Company, 1st Canadian Army.

Cheers,

Chris

AoS
 

Hello Chris,

Thanks for that. Any idea of the colour of the AoS?

Cheers
Kevin

uh....Chris.....
 

First...Howdy.
Long time no hear.
Second, your timing is awful. I'm just putting the finishing touches on my Resi-chunk D7 (un-armoured) from the same unit....Steve G. and I looked into a photo of one from the same unit some time back and concluded that it would be an RCE unit, not RCASC.....so, a blue background was duly hand painted on my Dozer. Same number and A of S sign style though.

Steve mentions in an email that the dozers wre operated by company HQ of Field Park Companies.

So am I repainting this thing in time for Capcon next weekend or what?
:)

Cheers
Don

Hi Don,

I thought you had dropped off the face of the world. Good to hear from you again.

I was perfectly happy with dozers being under the RCE umbrella myself, sporting a 344 over a blue background AoS. When I saw a good front frame of "Slippery Sue" in this Pathe film though, the AoS looks to me to be of two distinctly different shades of paint with a split white bar. I'm guessing the colours here and the Corps affiliation, so I'm open to suggestion.

Cheers,

Chris

Don,

Further to my last, the more I look at the photo and having enlarged it, the more I'm leaning towards the distinct possibility that it could be a single light coloured AoS sign behind that "344".

That's more in keeping with the RCE parent corps, which makes more sense to me. The white bar signifying an army unit affiliation. How's that for waffling? If it were me, I wouldn't repaint that D7 of yours.

Cheers,

Chris

For what it's worth, the AoS marking in question is that of 1st Mechanical Equipment Company, R.C.E., who were Army Group Troops (21st Army Group)

Cheers :)

Another 'armoured dozer' of the 1st Mechanical Equipment Company, R.C.E. - Udem, 1945.

Cheers :)

Mark,

Thanks for clarifying that. Now if you can dispose of that AoS sign I mistakenly posted, that would be great. No sense misleading people with my faulty interpretation.

As an aside, the RCE certainly had some colourful names for their dozers. I seem to remember 'Picadilly Commando' as being another.

Cheers,

Chris

'nother 'dozer
 

This is from the Cdn Archives. taken in Italy. Only markings I can make out are on the side - M7/21

http://www.servicepub.com/images/pa142069.jpg

Re: Armoured Dozer
 

Its not the WD number but the chassis number. 1T1007. This is usually visible on the front of the armoured D7. Strangely, allthough this alphanumeric sequence is typical Caterpillar, they do not list 1T serials in their production list. It has been suggested that these vehicles were assembled by someone other than Caterpillar. 'Normal' D7s being 3T, 4T and 7M serials.

Another 'dozer' of the 1st Mechanical Equipment Company, R.C.E. - Caen, Aug 1944.

Cheers :)

Thank you for your help.
 

Great help and advice as always guys.


Chris

You wouldn't happen to have a scan of "Piccadilly" by any chance.

Cheers
Kevin

If you have it, Picadilly Commando appears on page 198 of Don Graves's South Alberta Regiment history.

Cheers,

Chris

Can you confirm......
 

The spelling please Chris?
Piccadilly ( as in London ) has two c's.
I have just found another little gem of a dozer on British Pathe called "Jaq (c) ueline", although I am not sure what sort it is.

Cheers
Kevin

Yes, the name has two c's.

Cheers,

Chris

Armoured Bulldozer
 

Here is a drawing by official Canadian War Artist Capt. O.N. Fisher. Caption reads "Engineers clearing roads through Caen". AoS number is '48'

http://www.servicepub.com/images/dozer.jpg

Re: Armoured Bulldozer
 

Just to add to what Clive said, I've seen the painting of this drawing and the dozer's AoS serial and formation sign are that of the 3rd Field Park Company, R.C.E. which was part of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division.

Cheers :)

Here's anther picture of an Armoured Dozer

IWM BU 4333
"A bulldozer demolishing a road block for the entry of British armour into Bremen."
Date: 1945-04-25

Attachment 118553
Source: https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/i...ject/205428687


Attachment 118554
Source:https://www.ebay.com/itm/1945-German...m/393069131554

Looking through a museum’s archive of scans, I just came across these two pages from the London Illustrated News from 11 November 1944, that I thought might be interesting/amusing here:

Attachment 120122 Attachment 120123

(In the scan, the first page was blank above the part shown here, so I trimmed it down.)

Jakko,

Thanks, interesting to read how they tried to explain the weapons of war to the general public.

British Pathe: Invasion Scenes Europe 1945
 

Here's a link to the film: https://www.britishpathe.com/video/i...nes-europe-14/

Note you can view it as a film or as stills.

Attachment 120127

A minor part of these bulldozers, but I found PDFs of original manuals for the winches used on the D6A and D7A:

Attachment 129601 Attachment 129602

The serial numbers indicated are technically not for the armoured versions, but the D6A was basically a D6-5R with an armoured cab and hydraulic dozer blade and the D7A was a similarly modified D7-7M, so I doubt the winches would have been very different.

Edit: I just realised that site is making linking to the right page difficult. In the menu on the left, choose Allied Winch → Operator’s Manuals → Archive to find the ones I mentioned above.

Allied Systems Company archive
 

Nice find Jakko!

Good to see some manufacturers still provide this sort of information to the users of their products.

There is probably more stuff there that some restorers might find useful, but I didn’t really look beyond a quick glance.

D7A No.31 "GLADY'S", Rue de la Gare at Caen, read more here: https://flic.kr/p/2b1zaVX

Attachment 132747

Nice find :)

Armoured Dozer with the number IT1019 at Blainville (Calvados), France - read more here https://flic.kr/p/26Vw7u1

Attachment 132748

And here is 1T3037 - read more here: https://flic.kr/p/UQuecL

Attachment 132750

Jakko, There were other options for winches (for those who dont know) There were (Carco ?) twin drum winches used on "cable controlled" equipment. Some Cats (D7) had cable controlled blades and a second drum was used to operate the bowl on a scraper. I assume the millitary dozers used in airfield construction were fitted with them?