Caterpillar D6A

[Jakko Westerbeke]

At the invitation of its new owner, I went to look at a D6A today:

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This arrived last Monday from the UK, where it had sat outside, apparently in the woods, for a good amount of time. It still has fairly substantial pieces of the original armour plate (22 mm thick, incidentally — I don’t think I’ve read the actual thickness anywhere) as well as the fuel and hydraulics tanks, seat, instrument panel etc. of the armoured version rather than the normal, unarmoured D6. The tracks are also the original military ones, which apparently differ from the civilian type in both width (50 cm vs. 44, IIRC) and material (high-nickel steel vs. lower-quality). The remains of original military paint are still there too, under the yellow.

The ID plate is still legible:

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Chassis number 1T3045.

And it came with these bits too:

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The original winch and dozer blade, though the latter appears to have been modified to be a snow plough and the arm is incomplete, partially rusted through and with bits sheared off. But it should be repairable, by the looks of it.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Wow, what a find! Is this part of the Cat stable of Willem de Braal?


PS: for good measure I attached a picture of D6A - 1T3037 35839-1136 LCT = Det 59 M E Sec - Dozer Exxx221- (censored) 'WINNIE FAY.'- p012929 as identified by Michel Saberly:

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Source: https://flic.kr/p/zRPqD6

[Jakko Westerbeke]

Willem is the one who posted about it here, but the dozers are owned by the De Braal family, yes. They’ve got three D6s now

The intention is to put the armoured cab back onto this one, probably by fabricating a complete replacement and fitting it instead of the cut-down one that’s still on the vehicle now (the real one, of course, will be saved as well).

[Alex van de Wetering]

I agree....what a find......and not 1, but 3 CATs, sounds like the project has got very serious!
Thanks for sharing the pictures Jakko. I hope Willem will drop by to tell us more about the project and his exiting finds!

The intention is to put the armoured cab back onto this one, probably by fabricating a complete replacement and fitting it instead of the cut-down one that’s still on the vehicle now (the real one, of course, will be saved as well).

Personally I would try to complete this one by welding in the missing pieces, rather than making a complete repro set of armour......it would be a shame not to use as much of the original as possible and it's certainly no disgrace if one can see where new sections were welded in.....it would tell an interesting part of it's history!

[John P]

What kind of shape is the undercarriage and track frames in?.The folks with the ACMOC might also be of some help with your machine.Very nice find

www.acmoc.org

[Jakko Westerbeke]

Originally Posted by Alex van de Wetering

sounds like the project has got very serious!

You don’t know the next part yet … “We’re trying to get a permit to dig a big hole in your beach”

Originally Posted by Alex van de Wetering

Personally I would try to complete this one by welding in the missing pieces, rather than making a complete repro set of armour......it would be a shame not to use as much of the original as possible and it's certainly no disgrace if one can see where new sections were welded in.....it would tell an interesting part of it's history!

I had assumed they would weld plates into the openings, but when I mentioned this, I was told that apparently their plan is to fabricate a new cab completely. “You’ll never get welded-in plates to look quite right” I think was the reason. My POV was also that if you close the holes, you’ll have the original armour on it as much as possible.

Originally Posted by John P

What kind of shape is the undercarriage and track frames in?.

I’m not a real vehicle restoration expert (the 1:35 scale versions are more my thing) but they looked OK, though some of the sheet metal was rusted. The track, though, still works fine — the links moved under my weight as I stood on top of it to get into the cab.

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As said, though, they have two other D6s, and plan to use parts from at least one of them.