The Tatra 13 is a vintage truck made by

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus *Czech (surnam ...

manufacturer Tatra. It was manufactured between 1924 and 1933. The Tatra 13 can be considered one of the first utility vehicles designed, constructed, and mass produced by Tatra. The truck was derived from model

Tatra 11 The Tatra T11 is an automobile that was produced from 1923 through 1927. It was the first Tatra model to use backbone tube chassis, swinging half-axles and air-cooled engine, the development of which is still in use on the trucks produced by Tatr ...

, with which it shared components and differed from it by strengthened rear axle. Initially the front wheels didn't have brakes. As Tatra 11 was succeeded by Tatra 12 (1926), the truck underwent modernization, which among other things brought it brakes to all four wheels.

Design

Engine

The Tatra 13 initially used the engine from the

, and later (since 1926) was manufactured with the Tatra 12 engine. It is a four-stroke, spark ignition, two-cylinder

air-cooled Air-cooled engines rely on the circulation of air directly over heat dissipation fins or hot areas of the engine to cool them in order to keep the engine within operating temperatures. Air-cooled designs are far simpler than their liquid-cooled ...

boxer engine A flat engine is a Internal combustion engine#Reciprocating engines, piston engine where the cylinders are located on either side of a central crankshaft. Flat engines are also known as horizontally opposed engines, however this is distinct ...

, with a capacity of 1057 cc and power of about at 2800 rpm. The gearbox had four speeds (+reverse).

Chassis

The initial chassis was derived from Tatra 11, while later from Tatra 12. The front axle is stiff, suspended by transverse half-elliptic spring, carried by the aluminium engine block, while the rear axle consists of two independent swinging half-axles, suspended by a transverse half-elliptic spring, which is mounted on top of the differential box and leaning its ends against the brake plates. The advantage of this solution is excellent progressiveness of the suspension.

Versions

The vehicle weighed about 1000 kg while it had payload of 800–1200 kg depending on version. Tatra 13 was offered foremost as a small truck, however also buses were derived from it. It differs from Tatra 11 and 12 not only by the carrossery, but also by use of larger wheels at the rear.

References

13 Rear-wheel-drive vehicles 1920s cars 1930s cars Vehicles introduced in 1924 {{Vintage-auto-stub