Transitional Cat Prototype Discovered

Our American friend and heavy equipment enthusiast Anthony Lucibello, who hails from North Branford, Connecticut, has unearthed another unusual machine and shared the images for us to enjoy.

All major construction machinery manufacturers build prototypes, some of the design ideas eventually make it into full production, whilst others are never to be seen again. Some of these weird and wonderful protype machines are sold off in auctions and make it onto sites, whilst others are simply stripped down and repurposed.

It’s always interesting to see the ones that got away, like this Cat 225 that was clearly built adopting some ideas for the coming 300-Series models. The 200-Series Caterpillar excavators were first officially launched as far back as 1972, when they were somewhat late entrants into the hydraulic excavator market, as they revealed the 225, that was revolutionary at the time.

The cab looks to be very similar to those found on the Mitsubishi based E Series Cat’s of the early 1990’s.

Also interesting to see is the access point, with steps, across in front of the engine bay, similar to the layout that was common on the later Poclain models of the time. I would suggest that dipper, boom and undercarriage is all 100% Cat 225, whilst the cab and upperbodywork is totally Mitsubishi inspired. Any additional background/feedback would be most welcome. 

A friend of Anthony’s, David Gruhot, also shared what is considered to be a conceptual design sketch of the machine.

In an update on Anthony’s post, it transpires that the machine was sold at an equipment auction in Kentucky and made a decent $7,000 USD.

We thank Anthony for allowing us to share these images here on the Digger Man Blog