The Lanz Bulldog was a tractor

Tractor

A tractor is a vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery used in agriculture or construction...

 manufactured by Heinrich Lanz AG in Mannheim

Mannheim

Mannheim is a city in southwestern Germany. With about 315,000 inhabitants, Mannheim is the second-largest city in the Bundesland of Baden-Württemberg, following the capital city of Stuttgart....

, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. Production started in 1921 and various versions of the Bulldog were produced up to 1960. John Deere

John Deere

John Deere was an American blacksmith and manufacturer who founded Deere & Company, one of the largest and leading agricultural and construction equipment manufacturers in the world...

 purchased Lanz in 1956 and started using the name "John Deere-Lanz" for the Lanz product line. A few years after the Bulldog was discontinued the Lanz name fell into disuse. The Lanz Bulldog was one of the most popular German tractors, with over 220,000 of them produced in its long production life. The name "Bulldog" is widely used in Germany as a synonym for tractors even today, especially in Bavaria

Bavaria

Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...

.

Engine

The Bulldog was an inexpensive, simple, and easily maintained vehicle due primarily to its simple power source: a single cylinder, horizontal, two-stroke, hot bulb engine

Hot bulb engine

The hot bulb engine, or hotbulb or heavy oil engine is a type of internal combustion engine. It is an engine in which fuel is ignited by being brought into contact with a red-hot metal surface inside a bulb....

. Initially the engine was a 6.3 litre, 12 horsepower

Horsepower

Horsepower is the name of several units of measurement of power. The most common definitions equal between 735.5 and 750 watts.Horsepower was originally defined to compare the output of steam engines with the power of draft horses in continuous operation. The unit was widely adopted to measure the...

 unit, but as the Bulldog evolved the engine was increased to 10.3 litres and 55 horsepower. While hot bulb engines were crude they were easy to maintain and could burn a wide variety of low grade fuels – even waste oils.

Lanz Iberica

Bulldogs were also produced in Spain by Lanz Iberica S.A. at Getafe near Madrid. A total of 17,100 tractors was built from 1956 to 1963.

Bulldog copies

The Bulldog was copied in various other countries, sometimes under license, sometimes not:

France

‘Le Percheron’ was a licensed copy of the 25 HP hot-bulb Bulldog built by Société Nationale de Construction Aeronautic du Centre (SNCAC) at Colombe in France from about 1939. It is believed that nearly 3,700 were built before production ceased in 1956.

Australia

The KL Bulldog was produced by Kelly & Lewis of Springvale, Victoria, Australia from 1948 to December 1952. Just over 860 were built, based on the 35 HP Model N Bulldog.

Poland

Ursus produced a copy of the 45 HP Bulldog at the ZMU factory (Zaklady Mechanicze Ursus) in Warsaw in Poland from 1947, referred to as the C-45

Ursus C-45

The Ursus C-45 and C-451 was a popular Polish model of tractor. It was manufactured from 1947 to 1959 by the Ursus Factory in Warsaw, and from 1960 to 1965 by Zakłady Mechaniczne in Gorzów Wielkopolski.-History:...

. This was replaced by the C451 in 1957. About 55,000 Ursus Bulldogs were built from 1947 until 1965.

Argentina

In 1951 a copy of the 55 HP Bulldog was produced by Industrias Aeronáuticas y Mecánicas del Estado in Argentina. The tractor was called ‘El Pampa’ and the badge on the front read IAME. From 1955 the tractor was produced by Dirección Nacional de Fabricaciones e Investigaciones Aeronáuticas and the badge was changed to DINFIA. A total of 3,760 Pampas were produced from 1951 to 1960.

Similar tractors

The Bulldog is similar to other European hot-bulb tractors produced in a similar time frame, such as SF Vierzon in France, Landini in Italy and HSCS in Hungary. It is also similar to the Field Marshall

Field Marshall

The Field-Marshalls were a range of British farm tractors manufactured by Marshall, Sons & Co. of Gainsborough, Lincolnshire.Field-Marshalls were in production from 1945 to 1957. However, the first single-cylinder Marshall came into production in 1930....

 produced in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 except that the Field Marshall has a diesel engine and not a hot-bulb engine.

External links

• Lanz tractors at TractorData.com
• Lanz tractor and its relationship with the Pampa tractor made in Argentina
• German WP article about the Lanz company: :de:Heinrich Lanz AG