Off Topic. Allis HD 10

They did not have a real bad reputation,but had there weaknesses (final drives I think) and the clutches will stick like a Cat. They have become fairly rare since the last spike in scrape. I use to know where there were some hiding in the hills and all have gone to China now. They are similar to the early Cats you start at the outside and keep removing things until you are where you need to fix,no components.

If it works it needs saving.

Hi, O-I-H.
Around where I worked here in DowNunda, the early ones with the 'driptroit' engines hadda reputation for doing final drives. That seemed to change somewhat when A-C started using the Buda engines. They eventually bought Buda out and changed the name to Allis Chalmers. I don't know whether they changed their engineering at that time as well or if it was simply getting away from the 'driptroits' that seemed to alleviate their final drive issues. Other than that, they seemed to be a good tractor.

Just my 0.02.

Buda went to Ac about 1956 or 7,I've got an HD 6 with a Buda, a few hundred more serial #'s and it would have been an AC, much better engine from what I understand, the Buda's will crack heads some what easy.
I'm familar with the HD 5's with a 2 cylinder Driptroit we have a 47 model and my 6 and they are both component tractors,I was thinking they may all have been that way.

Nice to see a little orange blood drip over on the yellow. The older AC's with the jimmy engines were a start at reinventing the orange tractors. Their ancestors were Mogul tractors. WW 2 caused a lot of changes to be made. Engine availability and knowledge to fix them pointed to the jimmy engines. The model M, K, KO were the original AC,s The K and a bigger model not in my mind now were all converted to Jimmy's and called the HD 7-10-14-and 19. Right after WW2 the HD 5 appeared on the scene. It was a completely different design with a double reduction final drive which had two bull and pinion gears on each side thus allowing the ring and pinion , steering clutches, transmission etc. to turn twice the speed but with half the strain on the gears. This eliminated much of the final drive, transmission problems on the older models. Also a new design with engine , transmission or clutch being removable as a separate unit for ease of repair. Following that the HD9, 15 and 20 with a 4-71 and 6-71's in the 15 and 20 all with the new final design. Also their new roller design with Timken bearings and their patented roller seals Which were spring loaded mating steel on steel surfaces were the best. first they were 1000 hr. rollers and later they called them life time rollers. They were too. They had a square split block that held the roller shafts to the frame but the hole was off set so when you wore the rollers down just flip the blocks over and trim off the flanges and wear them some more. We never built up rollers , just wore them out completely.

50's AC gave up on the dripping jimmy's and bought the Buda engine. Used in the HD 6-11-16-21 an it was an improvement but not until they redesigned the heads doing away with the pre-combustion chambers, added a turbo and dry air cleaners. By then they had a tractor that was easy to work on, had plenty of power and looked kind of nice. Always said if AC had put the 3-71 in the HD-5 and lengthened the track 1 roller there might not be any yellow tractors today. Drove them most of my life and yellow ones too but always admired the AC,s for their engineering, ease to work on and looks. Working construction back in the 50's-60's it seemed if an AC turned up on the job a lot of guys thought they were a proving ground expert and would do their damnedest to find a week spot but give them a yellow one and they treated it like their baby sister.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dx8wa7JLHbs&t=101s Lots of AC tractors. First side by side dozer I ever heard of.

Headerpuncher thanks for the overview on the AC model's , good reading.
Always good to hear it from an operator's perspective that done the yards!
Oh and the bit about (they treated it like their baby sister) have seen that too!👍
Gilbert.

Hi, Headerpuncher.
It's good to hear from somebody spent more time on them than I did. I only ever got to operate 1 A-C, a 'stick-shift' HD16 with a Buda 'donk' and a cable angle blade, a nice machine and man, could it climb with a loaded blade. I enjoyed operating it for the 3 months that I was on it.

As I understand it, A-C got there start in crawler tractors by buying out Monarch crawlers which also used tne name, 'Neverslip', in their early days, I suspect 'cos they bought out Neverslip. A-C began with the old Monarch models after they bought the company. These consisted of, amongst others, the Neverslip 18-30, the Monarch 50 and the Monarch 75. From what I can gather, it didn't take A-C long to change the name to A-C and introduce some new models, the M, S, K, W and L. The K and the L both had alternative models with a different diesel fuel-injected engine with lower compression than a normal diesel and with spark-assisted ignition to compensate for the lower compression ratio. These models were known as the KO and the LO but the engines were not a howling success, which apparently led to the decision to use driptroit diesels.

When they began the 'HD' line, they started with the 5, the 7 and the 10 and then introduced the HD14 which, at 130 hp, was the most powerful crawler on the market at the time, well before the 2U D8. They then went BACKWARDS from there. The next model they brought out, the HD15, was only about 115 hp. It wasn't until they brought out the HD19 with the 6-71 GM, around 10 years after the HD14, that they got back to 130 hp, followed by the HD20 which ran the 6-110 GM.

Again, as I understand it, when they began using the Buda engines, they also introduced the HD6, 11 and 16 and followed them with the 21, but I am open to 'kee-wreck-shun' on this. Then they bought out the Buda engine works and, as you said, they modified the Buda engines to deal with the head cracking and added a few refinements that made them a damned good engine. Also, as you mentioned, they brought out the 1,000 hour rollers and I think they had a torque converter model before Cat too.

In Eric Orlemann's book, "Caterpillar Chronicle", if my memory serves me rightly, Orlemann mentions that Buster Peterson built a Siamesed A-C dozer before he built the Siamesed D8s. I have often wondered since seeing that video, "A Big Job", if one or both of the Siamesed A-Cs there might have been some of Buster's handiwork. I noticed 2 different-looking Siamesed A-Cs in that video.

Just my 0.02.

Hi, Headerpuncher.
It's good to hear from somebody spent more time on them than I did. I only ever got to operate 1 A-C, a 'stick-shift' HD16 with a Buda 'donk' and a cable angle blade, a nice machine and man, could it climb with a loaded blade. I enjoyed operating it for the 3 months that I was on it.

As I understand it, A-C got there start in crawler tractors by buying out Monarch crawlers which also used tne name, 'Neverslip', in their early days, I suspect 'cos they bought out Neverslip. A-C began with the old Monarch models after they bought the company. These consisted of, amongst others, the Neverslip 18-30, the Monarch 50 and the Monarch 75. From what I can gather, it didn't take A-C long to change the name to A-C and introduce some new models, the M, S, K, W and L. The K and the L both had alternative models with a different diesel fuel-injected engine with lower compression than a normal diesel and with spark-assisted ignition to compensate for the lower compression ratio. These models were known as the KO and the LO but the engines were not a howling success, which apparently led to the decision to use driptroit diesels.

When they began the 'HD' line, they started with the 5, the 7 and the 10 and then introduced the HD14 which, at 130 hp, was the most powerful crawler on the market at the time, well before the 2U D8. They then went BACKWARDS from there. The next model they brought out, the HD15, was only about 115 hp. It wasn't until they brought out the HD19 with the 6-71 GM, around 10 years after the HD14, that they got back to 130 hp, followed by the HD20 which ran the 6-110 GM.

Again, as I understand it, when they began using the Buda engines, they also introduced the HD6, 11 and 16 and followed them with the 21, but I am open to 'kee-wreck-shun' on this. Then they bought out the Buda engine works and, as you said, they modified the Buda engines to deal with the head cracking and added a few refinements that made them a damned good engine. Also, as you mentioned, they brought out the 1,000 hour rollers and I think they had a torque converter model before Cat too.

In Eric Orlemann's book, "Caterpillar Chronicle", if my memory serves me rightly, Orlemann mentions that Buster Peterson built a Siamesed A-C dozer before he built the Siamesed D8s. I have often wondered since seeing that video, "A Big Job", if one or both of the Siamesed A-Cs there might have been some of Buster's handiwork. I noticed 2 different-looking Siamesed A-Cs in that video.

Just my 0.02.

O-I-H,

The old Allie Chalmers forum has a construction section that's pretty active, I bet you could get some information over there. Thanks.

Bryan

Thanks guys, lots of good information here. Headerpuncher, that was a great video of Garrison Dam. Working in North Dakota in the 70s I worked with a lot of fellows that cut there teeth on that project. I really enjoyed the stories they told. Your video gives some credibility to the stories they told. I am going to go look at the HD10 and see if I can make a deal. Like Frank and Mike on American Pickers, I'll try to bundle with some other stuff and make it a win for the owners and myself.