Svoboda, Kosmonosy
Svoboda, Kosmonosy
Václav Svoboda had started his career with the Laurin & Klement company, where he was apprenticed and over time progressed to the post of workshop foreman. He was not, however, satisfied with the position of an employee, which is why in 1919 he tried his luck with own production of electric motors and smaller appliances. This enterprise was not successful but that did not deter him and just four years later, he founded with K.J. Zahrádka a non-ferrous metal foundry near the main train station in Mladá Boleslav.
In 1926, he started his own company, working from his own workshop in nearby Kosmonosy, where he focused on the production of farming machinery. In 1927–1929, he added to it a foundry for non-ferrous metals and grey iron. Svoboda made threshers, sowing machines, winnowing blowers, stable engines, electric motors, and other agricultural machinery. Alongside agricultural machinery, his factory also made casts for printing, food-processing, and sugar mill machines as well as equipment for boiler rooms and chemical installations. Svoboda’s best-known product was the Svoboda Diesel Kar tractor, which was first presented at the Agricultural Exhibition in Prague in 1934.
Svoboda made four types of tractors, with power of 5, 7, 10, and 17hp. Later, Svoboda focused on developing a stronger tractor, Svoboda Diesel Kar 10, with power of 12hp. In 1941, he started to work on a tractor with 22hp, which he equipped with s Deutz engine. Alongside this, Svoboda was also making wood gas-powered tractors labelled Svoboda 25G.
Due to lack of Deutz engines, he had to stop the production of both tractors in 1943. After the war, Svoboda started to make tractors of a different design with 15hp. These were made until 1949, when the production of tractors had stopped. Already in the 1930s, management of the production was taken over by the founder’s son, Bohuslav Svoboda Jr. The company was nationalised in 1948. For a short time afterwards, the original range of products was continued but the company’s facilities were soon taken over by the nearby Škoda Company in Mladá Boleslav, which used them to make spare parts for automobiles.