Steel Soldiers::Military Vehicles Supersite - View Single Post

PorscheTech911 · 01-09-2010, 16:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by NMC_EXP

Almost all of the common collected vehicles use either the endless band track (halftrack, weasel, Cletrac) or steel track with the rubber molded in (M5 Stuart, M5 High Speed tractor, Sherman).

I am not familiar with the "endless band" design. Didn't these vehicles have rubber track shoes/grousers/pads? If so, were individual links replacable?

My suggestion is to tap into rubber product markets that are poorly served by overseas mfgrs, such as weatherstripping and molded rubber seals for miltary trucks and Jeeps. There are very unsatified users of these products right now, but there are no US made alternatives.

Rubber part manufacturing tends to be labor intensive and environmentally "unfriendly" so China and India are getting into it in a big way. Unfortunately, Quality Control ain't in their language. Rubber part quality is extremely process sensitive. A part which is dimensionally perfect and visually looks great can turn out to be garbage once it goes in service.

My experience is with molded (compression, transfer & injection) solid rubber. Never worked with extruded / continuous cured products or foam rubber like weatherstripping.

Regards

Jim

The endless band he is referring to is basically a large rubber band like you use to keep posters rolled up. They have no replaceable links, just like on a skid steer. Radmeister.com has products like the endless band track.

My suggestion would be to see if there is a way to make track pads for vehicles that did not originally come with them. Most ComBloc countries used only steel tracks and because of that they tear up the road pretty bad. The low price and ease of import for a ComBloc vehicle makes them popular, and being able to get rubber pads would be a big plus for some people.

Just my

PT911