Back in 2014, our Level 3 Agricultural Engineering students restored an International Harvester TD-18 Crawler tractor.
This goliath of the International crawler tractor range was built circa 1943-45 in the USA by the International Harvester Corporation.
The TD-18 was used by the USA military (where it was known as the M1 Heavy), for building defences and runways, up to and during the Second World War, and some were exported to England under the Lend-Lease scheme.
This particular tractor seems to have been in use by the British military during World War II, or soon after, and then sold off to a plant hire firm near Ashford, where it spent its time towing a scraper box to level land for roads and buildings.
Having languished in several sheds and workshops in the interim years, it was finally purchased by the College in November 2013 and transported to the College as a major project for the Land-Based Technology students to rebuild.
Part of the course content for the Level 3 Technical Qualification in Agricultural Engineering is to carry out servicing and maintenance on land-based equipment, and also to service and repair engines and components. For the students, the opportunity to fulfil that component of the course by working on this machine is a real treat.
The machine’s vital statistics are:-
- 11 tons in weight
- Diesel engine, but starts with petrol (which is an odd thing, to say the least!)
- 6 Cylinder 11 litre engine, which produces around 90hp (The average car engine is 1.6 litre!)