Fiat-SPA TM 40

The Fiat-SPA TM 40 was a 4x4 artillery tractor made between 1938 and 1948 by the Italian maker SPA, a subsidiary of Fiat V.I. It was meant to replace the Pavesi tractors but was never built in large enough numbers to do so, though its good performance kept it in service long after the Second World War. In 1938 the motorization directorate of the Royal Army opened a competition for a more powerful tractor for corps artillery and anti-aircraft guns, called the TMa, medium artillery tractor. Fiat-SPA, Alfa Romeo and Breda answered, and the army chose the Fiat-SPA design, whose stronger engine let it reach 42 kilometres an hour on the road where the others did not pass 35. It was adopted in 1939 as the TM40, but production started slowly in 1941 for lack of raw materials, with 48 delivered in 1941 and 364 in 1942, and the Royal Army had 432 before the armistice. It was a larger and stronger update of the TL 37, with a forward cab, four driven and steered wheels giving a turning circle under ten metres, and a 6 tonne winch at the rear, and it carried the driver, seven gunners and 250 kilograms of ammunition. It towed the 90/53 gun and a 149/19 howitzer, served as a crane truck to recover damaged trucks and tanks, and towed the M 15/42 medium tank on a Viberti trailer. A batch of 153 built in 1944 was taken over by the Wehrmacht.