The M.J. Smith collection of classic plant (Part One)

Tue 03 Dec 2013

The M.J. Smith collection of classic plant (Part One)

Mike Smith has a long heritage in the earthmoving game, having been involved in it from a young age with his father who ran a sports field construction business in the Reading area. This passion for all things earthmoving related continues to this day, with his current business that works primarily in golf course construction on a national and international basis. Over the years Mike has purchased a number of classic machines which he plans to restore when time permits. One of the rarest items he showed me was this Russian MoA3-546 motor scraper.

Mike Purchased this machine in as new condition ex-military from a Euro Auctions event many years ago and used it to landscape and carve out a lake at his property. Since those days it’s hardly done any work, and the cutting edges on its bowl still look as good as new. Hardly surprising either, as the hour meter inside the cab reads at just 100 working hours!

Here is a photo from the Digger Man Blog archives which is actually a cutting from a sales brochure I used to have. Wish I had not cut it up now!

Bringing back memories of a real bygone era of earthmoving and lying next to the motor scraper, was this old Onions towed scraper box, which is just crying out for a restoration job. One can imagine that the boys who used to pull these things really thought they were at the top of their game back in the day, a real reminder of just how much things have moved on today.

When Mike first bought this old Case 850G bulldozer, incredibly the machine had never touched a bit of earth. It had spent much of its life in the hold of a cargo ship pushing bone meal around for the dockside cranes to grab. This explains why it is shod with excavator style triple-grouser track plates. A nice little dozer, that still puts in a shift or two to this day.

The Case is coupled up to an original Bomag single drum vibratory roller which Mike described as still being a great tool.

Mike was given this 1950’s JCB Hydra Digger by a farmer who no longer had a need for it, sadly when he was parking it in position here it threw a “leg out of the bed” and whilst it was still running on three pots Mike parked it up as it is, where it has remained to this day!

Here’s a shot from the JCB archives featuring an advert for the machine back in the day.

For those with an interest in classic machines, why not join up with one of the forums where it all started for me. Classic Machinery Network is a friendly forum for those with a real passion for the old kit. For starters why not check out this thread on the JCB Hydra Digger featured above. In part two of this blog post I will continue my tour around this interesting collection, with a look at a trio of classic British machine’s and one all time classic from American heavy machinery giant, Caterpillar.

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