Priestman Excavators

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Nick Drew
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Priestman Excavators

Post #1 by Nick Drew » Sat Jun 23, 2007 12:08 pm

Here is a thread dedicated to that other great British excavator manufacturer which is also sadly no more Priestman Brothers of Hull.
The company was first established amazingly in 1873 and their early products were winches and grabs.
One of their first excavators was designed in 1920 it was a wheel mounted ditching grab which was towed & powered by a crawler tractor, the No 1 Grab Ditcher was first produced in 1921.

That was the start of a very successful company who went on to produce many different models of excavators including cable style machines like the Tiger, Wolf, Lion, etc through to the early 1960s when they marketed Yumbo Hydraulic machines like the Y35 & Y45.

They developed their own partly hydraulic hydro Cub in 1963 and then in 1965 the fully hydraulic Cub based Beaver (See Photos)
In 1967 the highly successful Mustang range was introduced starting with the Wheeled Mustang 90 over the the following 20 years the range consisted of nine different models.

In the mid nineties a rang of four mini excavators were offered built by Takeuchi of Japan they were marketed as Mini-Mustangs.
In 1987 Priestman were bought by the Sanderson group and three new Mustangs were offered the 2-12, 2-15, & 2-18 models.

Sadly the company was closed in 1990, another great British company gone to the wall.

I always thought from an operators perspective that the Priestman machines were far superior to those offered by Hymac but for some reason they always seemed to stay in Hymacs shadow.

Anyway enough of my rambling on here !! I hope you enjoyed my "pocket" history of Priestman and so here are some photos of some of the mentined machines starting with an old 1966 Beaver that I found on a farm here in Devon last year.
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #2 by Nick Drew » Sat Jun 23, 2007 12:22 pm

This old Priestman Mustang MK-III still earns its keep from time to time levelling harcore in a transport yard in the town where I live.

It would be great to see this machine restored to its former glory, a good shotblast & repaint and some new glass in the cab it would be good as new ....Well sort of !!
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #3 by Nick Drew » Sat Jun 23, 2007 12:38 pm

At one time Hymac & Priestman were engaged in a legal battle over Priestmans decision to call their new 12 ton machine the 580S which of course enraged the management at Hymac who had much success over the years with their own 580 series of machines, it ended up with Priestman having to change the number on the new machine to the 108S.

Here are a couple of scans of the promotional leaflets showing both numbers.
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #4 by Lars-Gunnar » Sat Jun 23, 2007 8:54 pm

Hi Nick!

Here is a link to http://www.maskinskyddarna.se (machine savers). Click on “Vrak” (Wreck) and a picture play opens. Click on the picture to enlarge them. On the left and the right side in the centre of the picture a pile appears meaning backward or forward. If you move your mouse to the pile as is hidden but appears when your mouse hit it you can speed up the tact or go back to the early picture once.

There is plenty of interesting equipment and on one of the pictures you can find a PRIESTMAN Lion IN in a relatively good condition I think. It is a excavator as use cables.

All of these machines is located in the north of Sweden in a county called Norrbotten.

Lars-Gunnar :)
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #5 by Nick Drew » Sun Jun 24, 2007 6:39 pm

Here are some more Mustangs....Great machines in their day!!
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #6 by Nick Drew » Sun Jul 22, 2007 12:52 pm

Here is a photo which was sent to me of an old Priestman excavator working in the china clay pits in Cornwall England
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #7 by Jeremy Rowland » Sat Sep 01, 2007 7:57 pm

Like Nick Im also a fan of these machines and there are still a few near to where I live, I can think of at least four machines!
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #8 by Nick Drew » Sat Sep 08, 2007 9:16 pm

Here is a Mustang that I came across today after a tip off by our new member Richard Shelbourne, this machine is working in a wood chipping yard just 13 miles from where I live in Devon.

I hope to find out more about this machine at some point when I return to the plant sales yard that is next door to look at an old Hymac that I could see in the yard.
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #9 by Robban_C » Sat Sep 08, 2007 10:22 pm

I notice that there is a linkage between the shaft and the shaft cylinder. Why?
I first thought that it was to give more angle on the shaft just like the linkage to the bucket.
But the shaft linkage has the same pivot point as the shaft itself (as far as I can see) so it will not give any more angle.
What´s the purpose of this linkage?
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Re: Priestman Excavators

Post #10 by IBH » Sat Sep 08, 2007 10:24 pm

Great shots of the Mustang Nick :thumbs_up:

Could anyone shed any light on why the hydraulic ram on top of the boom that connects to the dipper, is not connected directly to the top of the dipper but to a linkage that is connected to the dipper?

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