David Brown Tractor, Wall Art

Description

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Personally controlled since its inception by David Brown (1904–1993) the first venture into tractor production was in a joint project with Harry Ferguson in 1936 building the Ferguson-Brown tractor. David Brown became one of the biggest British tractor manufactures in the post war period, with a major manufacturing plant at Meltham, West Yorkshire England. The company broke new ground which others were only to follow later, but being a pioneering company ultimately led to its downfall. The Ferguson-Brown had many innovative features, including the use of cast alloy for many the components, which was light but prone to damage. The Ferguson-Brown used a Coventry Climax engine for the first 350 tractors. Browns developed their own engine which was fitted to subsequent production. Total production was 1350 + 1 built from parts in 1940 after production finished.^[4]

Brown and Ferguson disagreed over tractor design details in the late 30s, which led David Brown to design his own version, the VAK1, in secret. This was launched at the 1939 Royal Show.^[5] Ferguson split away from Brown and joined up with Henry Ford in 1938, after a ‘handshake’ agreement, to allow his Ferguson System three-point linkage to be used on the Fordson N tractors. That agreement was eventually terminated by Ford’s grandson in 1947 and Ferguson again split away to form Ferguson Tractors in 1948.^[6]

During World War II Brown’s new heavier tractor, the VAK1, was produced, with over 7,700 units eventually sold, making Brown a wealthy man. It is said the David Brown Tractor is the only one to be built onto a sturdy cast iron chassis where other makers bolt components together to form a chassis-less construction which is weaker. Brown also built aircraft tugs (VIG) for the Royal Air Force and for pulling the bomb trolleys used to re-arm aircraft. These tugs are distinctive, with truck like tyres, wrap round body work and HD bumpers front and rear, some being fitted with winches. In 1942 Brown started building a tracklayer version, the DB4. The DB4 was built for the army engineers and solved some of the problems found with the VTK, and got round an embargo on imported machines for military use. It was powered by a 38 h.p. Dorman diesel and a five-speed gearbox. The DB4 was replaced in 1950 by the Trackmaster 30.