Komatsu Connection To Cat

Tony - No!

definitely NO!

Get a hold of “the Komatsu Story” available over on The Heca site.
They did get a hold of a Cat tractor and more or less copied it. This was in the 30th

Another good read is “Yellow Iron”. It is a History of equipment manufactures.

Michibitchi does do Joint ventures with Cat check out any D3

Get a hold of “the Komatsu Story” available over on The Heca site.
They did get a hold of a Cat tractor and more or less copied it. This was in the 30th

Another good read is “Yellow Iron”. It is a History of equipment manufactures.

Michibitchi does do Joint ventures with Cat check out any D3

Here's something I recall from many years ago. I remember seeing either a "Co-Operator" L-W Magazine or a news letter from Columbus Equipment (L-W and Wabco and later Komatsu) dealer in Ohio. Time frame was in the early '60's (like '60 or '61) and the magazine was sent to my Dad. (We used to get these regularly from Marx Tractor (Allis-Chalmers), Ohio Machinery (CAT) and Rish Equipment (I-H).)
In that Co-Operator issue, there was an announcement which I believe was from L-W (or WABCO) that announced the introduction of a Komatsu Bulldozer. Since then, I've always believed there was a relationship between LeTourneau and Komatsu due to the restrictions that were placed on LeTourneau after they merged or sold out to Westinghouse.

I do recall that the machine looked part for part like a D-6 with Hyd. Blade.

Anyone else remember anything about this or maybe someone with an old Co-Operator collection can verify.

Hi, Folks.
If you care to take a wander back through the history of Kummagutsa, you will find that they have been around a LOT longer than just the early 60's. Over on the MMT site, there is a photo of a Kummagutsa dozer from about 1947 and I believe they were making dozers before World War 2.

Yes, the Kummagutsa dozers that we saw in here in DownUnder when they first started arriving here in the early-mid 60's were very much copies of Cats, usually with Cummins donks or eventually Kummagutsa copies of Cummins donks. The early Kummagutsa donks were for all the world copies of Cummins anyway.

If my (aging) memory serves me rightly, the steering clutch and brake adjusting procedure on an early Kummagutsa D80A was almost a clone of the
the Cat D6 8U-9U tractors.

The first Koma's I poked about inside of were small shovels , D50s-12 and D50a blades I think they had a dry back end ?? with the oil back end coming out about the same time as Cat, I also can lay claim to damaging one of the first 155 blades that was on "free demo" from Kamagatsu, while I was push loading some TS14's , I reversed the tractor into a tight corner at high speed (I was flat out and busy it seemed like there was a 100 of these TS14's after me) only to find myself near Knocked out of the cab by a fair sized tree branch, this branch smashed both the rear and front windows also bending the dust-bin size exhaust, I was told by the slasher to "Keep her Rolling", this little slip up had me shaking like the leaves on the poor tree, I was also given a small sales booklet at this time by the rep, inside it said that Kamagatsu built the first Hydraulic Bulldozer ??, I have seen pic's of real old Koma's that are still about in Australia and other parts from WW2 and they do look tough.
tctractors

Yes TC the D50A and S had dry back ends,foot clutch, steering clutch and brake on the levers, oscillating track frames,very placid reliable machine and it could out peform the 951 easily,the myth about Komatsu is really a load of crap,I am involved in the machinery repair business since 1953 and at that time there was plenty Cats around that were 15-20years old that had all sorts of repairs done at our yard,when Komatsu came on the scene in the mid sixties we done repairs on them as well,I could safely say that I have seen the insides of as many machines as the next man and have yet to see anything on a Komatsu thats copied from Cat,anyone that thinks that a company like Cat would allow another manufacturer to copy any of their hundered of patents is very naive indeed,if Komatsu infringed any Cat patent Cat would be delighted as thats all they would have needed and put Komatsu out of business at a stroke and you can bet Cat bought a few Komatsus and checked them out there were billions at stake,in the fifties and sixties there were a lot of machines that came and went including the home brands but Komatsu stayed and is here to stay because the simple fact is the contractor wants them,no good for my business but I don't care now Iv'e done my bit. Komatsu did make bulldozers before Cat in 1943,Ah maybe Cat copied Komatsu
Go to the link below for a bit of Komatsu history.
AJ
http://www.komatsu.com/CompanyInfo/profile/outline/history.html#c04