Cletrac

[Keith Webb]

What can people tell me about this airfield tractor?



It belongs to collector Ian Styles of Temora who has is housed in a large shed along with many other interesting vehicles.

Ian comments this was used on one of the airbases to tow Flying Fortresses and Liberators.

He cringes at the thought of breaking one of the synthetic rubber tracks, so it doesn't get moved much.

He restored it from the remains of two vehicles and says they are quite rare now. He was unable to get the correct grille.

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally posted by Keith Webb
What can people tell me about this airfield tractor?

M2 High-Speed Tractor built by Cleveland Tractor Co., popularly known as a "Cletrac":

Source: http://www.skylighters.org/encyclopedia/cletrac.html

Google for more information and pictures.

Looks like Ian used a grille off a civilian Cletrac tractor.

And yes, a broken rubber track will be major headache - ask any M29 Weasel owner!

HTH,
Hanno

[Richard Farrant]

Originally posted by Keith Webb
What can people tell me about this airfield tractor?

Hi Keith,

There were a few that came to light in the UK some years ago and appeared to have been in store somewhere. They carried RAF serials but underneath could be seen US numbers. Used for recovering and manouvering heavy aircraft as you say. The grille on Ian's one looks to be off a Cletrac dozer.

Richard

[Keith Webb]

"A Cletrac is prominently featured in this photo of two specially marked Mitsubishi G4M-1 ("Betty") diplomatic
aircraft on an airfield on Ie Shima, Ryukyu Islands, on August 19, 1945. (U.S. Naval Historical Center.)"

Source

Thanks for the prompt assistance, chaps!

[cletrac (RIP)]

The Cletrac M2 was used to tow bombers and fighters (US Mustang squadrons each had three of them and the bomber squadrons probably had more) on the airfields in WW2 and being equipped with a winch, 110v generator, and 2500 psi air compressor, was used to service the aircraft too. I've attached a photo of my M2 pulling the B17 "Memphis Belle" from the movie at an airshow in 2003. Here's a link to a bunch of pictures I had posted on the Cletrac.org site.

http://cletrac.org/pages/model/pic-MG.html

They have a 150 hp engine and it's amazing how much power it has for a 1943 machine. I asked the B17 pilot why they needed that much power and he commented, "Sure the bombers are easy to pull like this but spang one into the runway when there's 50 more waiting to land and you need all the power and traction you can get to pull the wreckage out of the way for the next guy to land.
Cletrac made about 8300 of them but from what I can discover there's probably less than 50 complete restored machines left. That makes them quite rare. Mine is likely the only RCAF example in existence. It was used at a British Commonwealth Air Training Plan airbase at Prince Albert, Saskatchewan with a grass runway and lots of snow so the available traction would have been greatly appreciated.

[Tony Smith]

Keith, there are another two restored ones owned by a tractor enthusiast from Dubbo, NSW. He doesn't move in military circles but I have photos (not digital) of them from a tractor show. I'll have to dig them out. Apparently his father bought from a RAAF auction in the '50s.