The Bombardier Snow Coach, models B12, C12 and B18 were produced for longer than any other Snow Cat. They start in the 1930's and continue well into the 70's. They originally had Wood Bodies with round windows. They had optional wheels that could be put in the place of the skiis on the front for summer operation.
The early machines had Chrysler Industrial Flat Head Six motors. Later machines had automatic transmissions and Chrysler 318's. On the "North Slope" , the Prudhoe Bay Oilfields, they were converted to 6.2 Liter GM Diesels and equipped with 300 gallon fule tanks for Arctic Surveying. The Survey outfit ran a fleet of some 20 to 30 machines set up this way. They were fast, capeable of 45 MPH Speeds on the Tundra. The Larger B18 was used extensively in Canada as School Buses and for touring on the Glaicers. Most of the machines at Yellowstone are older machines that have been restored many times. Several companies that have tour concessions run them.
In Canada and Glaciar Park they have been replaced by Giant Tired Vehicles that are built by Nodwell/Foremost, Kind of a cross between a Grayhound bus and a Monster truck, but in a 6X6 configuration. The B12 drives like a boat in deep powder. There's a time delay between when you turn the wheel and when it starts turning. They don't do well in rough terraine and will only back up on frozen lakes or ice. They made a lot of B12's. At one point Bombardiere went into a limited partnership with Chrysler. There are pictures of a row of new B12's parked in front of the Chrysler headquarters. An Equipment dealer in Fairbanks Alaska named Tony Karl who runs River City Equipment was the middle man for the liquidation of the fleet of these machines belonging to Western Goephysical. They had containers full of spare parts and these special replacemant floor plates made out of formed, pressed, aluminum diamond plate. These were custom made by the geophysical company and there were lots of them. Now Western Geophysical runs Tucker Terra's and Foremost Tire Rigs in place of the B12's.
I believe the actual production run for these machines was 1937 or 38 to 1974. There was also a smaller B7 that was the same configuration but smaller with only 2 wheels on each track. These B7's are very rare as only about 120 were built. They were popular with doctors in Canada as they didn't start plowing the roads there for many years.Canadian government subsidizing of snow plowing didn't occur until late in history which accounted for the popularity and large number of machines being built. It is likely that more Bombardiere B12's were built than any outher single model of Tracked Snow Vehicle to date.
