Unloading plough at Craigvinean Forest
The photograph is courtesy of Ian Cameron, Ballater, who has provided the information.
‘In the photo you see Bob Budge driving his Caterpillar 7U D4 (F.C. 1374) as he hitches up to unload his Cuthbertson plough from the petrol engined, Bedford truck.
Others in the photo that morning were: Lawrie McGregor (in white shirt) who took over Jim Connel’s Fiat 60 and was ploughing mate with Bob Budge, and also Dave Dewar who was the F.C. lorry driver on the Creagvinean squad.
Now the plough is up on its hooks, which was the normal travelling position, but, when loaded on the truck and the spherical hitch was released the weight of the plough body dropped to the truck’s platform floor and the hitch jumped a good 12 inches into the air. The advised best practice was to place a wooden batten under the plough body before releasing the hitch, but this was often ignored.
The plough was unloaded on the winch, and then the spherical hitch was re-attached on the level ground. However the operation shown here was exacerbated by the extreme angle of the make-shift loading ramp being used. This was not the norm. The operators much preferred to load/unload on more level ground’.
This is a great action shot of an everyday event and shows the challenges of moving heavy machinery about with the small lorries and onto less than robust loading banks. This is an early version of the Cuthbertson plough frame with peat plough head fitted. The double round arch and the forward facing A frame soon gave way to a single A frame in later version especially following the use of hydraulics. Note that the long vertical stabilising pole which slotted into the flanges on the round arch has been uncoupled and lying forward out of sight. If left up it would, and often did, cause problems when running below bridges and tree branches.
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Groups: Forestry Areas, Forestry in Action, Groups of people, Tractors Ploughs and Drainage Machines