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Posted by David Sherman on Thursday, March 19, 2009 at 21:17:40 :
In Reply to: Re: Good looking 1969 Tucker on ebay posted by Keith in Washington on Thursday, March 19, 2009 at 19:52:40 :
Yes, the '55 I bought from Jonas is a "443" model, which was a pickup version originally like the one now on ebay, but somebody had enclosed the back. My '52 is a "442" model, which was built as a "sedan".
I would like to see a good picture of the track bending tool, as I don't have one and some of my tracks are getting sloppy. The newer pontoons have an adjustable segment at one end that will accommodate a good bit of wear, but with the older pontoons there's no option except for bending the track links.
Like with every tracked vehicle, track maintenance is the biggest chore on a Sno-Cat. There are 240 track rollers on each machine, each of which has to be greased at least once a year. There are some newer rollers with sealed bearings, but nobody is making replacement rollers now. It would be a good job for a small machine shop to get into. I think you could do it with two screw-machine parts and a stock sealed bearing pressed together. Track rollers tend to unscrew themselves and fall out of the track, or the non-sealed bearings go bad since water is always getting into them.
The track link pins also wear, and of course there's nothing to be done for that except replace the parts. Nobody's making tracks or pontoons (the part the track goes around) either. Compared to modern rubber tracks running on rubber bogie wheels, the all-steel system of the old Tuckers makes for a lot of wear. Still, they really do have an amazing ability to clamber through very rough, snowy terrain, steep hills, big tree holes, and at least with my old ones, narrow roads.
Before I bought the Tucker, I got the Argo salesman to bring one of his rigs up for a drive. The Argo is a Canadian-built plastic-tub tracked snow buggy kind of like a weasel. It quickly got bogged down in deep snow that would have been no problem at all for a Tucker. Weasels are probably similar since both machines have a broad body tub that's low to the ground. The Tuckers sit up high so the tracks can go deep down in soft snow without the machine sitting on its belly flailing around.
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