Skoda

In 1858, Count Waldstein established a foundry and engineering works in the Czech city of Plzen to manufacture equipment for sugar mills, breweries, mines and railways among other things. In 1869, a local engineer and entrepreneur, Emil Skoda, purchased the factory from Waldstein and the broadened the range of products to include armaments - at the start of the First World War the company was the largest arms manufacturer in Austria-Hungary. The war years saw the first attempts at building automobiles and road tractors. In 1917, a small automotive department was set up in the Skoda factory to produce purpose-built heavy vehicles. In 1925, Škoda purchased the Mlada Boleslav firm of Laurin & Klement and continued production of the latter's motor ploughs, as well as transferring its manufacture of automobiles to Mladá Boleslav. The first true Skoda tractors emerged from the Plzen works in 1926, and these made use of existing four-cylinder petrol-paraffin automobile engines. A total of 750 of the first model, the HT-30, were produced and this was followed in 1929 by the two-cylinder HT-18, which went through three different incarnations before production ended in 1936. A four-cylinder HT-25 was also added to the line at the end of the decade. The 1930s saw tractor production move to Mlada Boleslav, where local design engineers improved on the existing HT-30 and HT-18 models, and developed a brand new HT-33 model based on the HT-25. The last of the petrol/paraffin models, the HT-40, was introduced in 1937 and the first Skoda diesel tractor, the HT-20 (with petrol start), appeared in 1941 - both of these models were also offered with gas producer units during the Second World War. Crawler tractors for military and industrial purposes were also manufactured and sold under the name Skoda WD-40 HP. The end of the Second World War saw the Mlada Boleslav plant concentrate on car manufacturing, and Skoda tractor production returned to Plzen in 1946 with the introduction of the Skoda 30 diesel tractor. Production of this highly successful model continued until 1951, although a few tractors were assembled several years later from spare parts by another firm. The Skoda Works in Plzen was nationalized after the war and remained in state ownership until 1989, when a complex period of trasformation began. In 1992 the firm was privatized and its manufacturing activity expanded with the purchase of the Tatra and Liaz vehicle factories and the construction of additional plants. However, subsequent financial problems led to major restructuring and all associated companies are now under the auspices of Skoda Holding, a.s. The Mlada Boleslav automobile plant, subsequently known as Skoda Auto, became part of the Volkswagen group in 1991.