Military Dozers in Normandy 1944

[Wulf]

Guys... from a French website containing hundreds of incredible images check out these superb archive photos of dozers supporting the allied advance and clearing up in Normandy. Kind of humbling when we are discussing the pros and cons of cabs and AC and being terrified about falling off our dozers:

http://www.archivesnormandie39-45.org/index.html

To find HD versions of the images click on 'recherge guidee' and enter 'dozer' in the search function.

[Countryboy]

Great find Wulf. :drinkup

Thanks for the site and pics.

[Dozerboy]

X2
That one guy has a closed cab I bet the heater works.

[DPete]

Top pic looks like a D7, the bar across the top has the cable inside comming from the rear cable control. It is called a (headache bar) for obvious reasons. Bottom looks like a 2U D8, don't recognise the hyd dozer though. DP

[Squizzy246B]

I like the name on the headache bar (First Pic).

[OzDozer]

The logistics of keeping up supplies to the amount of mechanised equipment, that the Americans landed in France on D-Day, are eye-opening.
At one stage, the fuel requirement was a million gallons a day .. a large proportion of which, was decanted into jerrycans.
Here is a pic of just one small collection of jerrycans being decanted into, from tankers ..

http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/6465/jerrycansem7.jpg

[Grader4me]

Wow! Could you imagine!.... Good to see you back OzDozer. Interesting stuff!

[Countryboy]

The logistics of keeping up supplies to the amount of mechanised equipment, that the Americans landed in France on D-Day, are eye-opening.
At one stage, the fuel requirement was a million gallons a day .. a large proportion of which, was decanted into jerrycans.
Here is a pic of just one small collection of jerrycans being decanted into, from tankers ..

http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/6465/jerrycansem7.jpg

Wow, is that one of them jerry can farms I heard about. How long does it take for them to be ripe enough to pic. :D

Seriously, I would hate to have that job. You'd be dreaming about jerry cans when you went to sleep. How many you reckon are in there?

[OzDozer]

How many you reckon are in there?I'll start counting right now .. and let ya know, this time, next week .. :D

[PSDF350]

Cool pics.

[OzDozer]

The first two pics in this thread show two, 3T series Cat D7's .. which were the most common WW2 military tractor. The third pic shows an 8R series, D8 .. which was about the second most common WW2 Cat.

It's unusual to see the D8 fitted with a hydraulic blade, as the U.S. Military settled on cable control as the Military standard for attachment operation, in early 1942 .. because of the persuasive powers of one Mr Robert G LeTourneau.

He had an innate hatred of hydraulics, after some bad experiences with them in the late 1920's and early 1930's (mostly due to the fact, that hydraulics in that era, operated at about 500 psi, were slow as a wet week, and used leather seals!).
He was convinced that hydraulics were never going to be successful, and the military chiefs were swayed by his arguments, that cable was simpler, faster, didn't need oil, didn't spring leaks, or blow hoses, and that hydraulic down pressure lifted the tractor off the ground .. thus reducing traction! :rolleyes:

The fully armoured D7 is an interesting item. There were a sizeable number of these armoured D7's built for the Normandy landings, by the British Military. Somewhere (on one of the tank sites, I think) there is a picture of a sizeable line of them, in a British Military encampment, ready to go.
God only knows what that hotbox must have been like to operate.

In 1943, the Australian Military experimented with armouring a D8 in a similar fashion. In the hot-to-very-hot climatic conditions of Australia, and the S.W. Pacific, the armoured D8 just became a roasting oven, and it became impossible to drive it. The idea was rapidly dropped.

The Australian War Memorial has the biggest collection of pictures, artifacts, and war equipment, including captured war trophies, of any collection in the world. Their pictorial database is fascinating to look at.
Looking under 'Second World War' .. use search words such as, 'Caterpillar', 'crawler', 'grader', 'Carryall', 'LeTourneau' 'airfield construction', 'jeep', etc .. to see hundreds of interesting pics of WW2 war effort.

http://cas.awm.gov.au/TST2/cst.acct_master?surl=1035305063ZZNDSRYHJEDG40912&stype=4&simplesearch=&v_umo=&v_product_id=&screen_name=&screen_parms=&screen_type=RIGHT&bvers=4&bplatform=Microsoft%20Internet%20Explorer&bos=Win32

(pics courtesy of the AWM collection) ..

[Wulf]

The logistics of keeping up supplies to the amount of mechanised equipment, that the Americans landed in France on D-Day, are eye-opening

The British, Canadians, Poles, Norwegians, Free French et al needed petrol for their efforts as well... 172,000,000 imperial gallons of it by VE day in May 1945. From August 1944 most of it was pumped under the sea through PLUTO - Pipe Lines Under The Ocean

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Pluto

[544D10]

I'll start counting right now .. and let ya know, this time, next week .. :D

Approx 5,000 cans. Looks to be 100 from left to right, with cans back to back you could say 200 for a colum. with approx 25 rows.

What are the chances those are automatic shut off nozles???