Anyone who has ever driven a tractor will find this article strangely familiar. Tractors generally have two brake pedals, one for each wheel. When driving over roads or hard surfaces those pedals are locked together to keep the vehicle from swerving off the road due to a carelessly applied foot. Off-road these separate brakes are used both to turn tighter corners as well as a poor man's substitute for a differential lock - with diff lock applied the driver has to remember not to rely on differential braking as that just wears out the brakes without achieving anything useful.
I have a few tractors around the farm, all of them have two brake pedals/levers. This even goes for the smallest of them all, an Irus U1200 two-wheel tractor with an 8 hp Hatz diesel.
Not unlike a motorcycle either where at least the older ones had separate controls for front and rear brakes. Some newer bikes have linked brakes where applying front and/or rear partially actuates the other end as well.
You can't steer with that though. The linked breaks are mostly for traction control and to stop you disturbing the chassis too much.
[edit] got called on the "can't steer" part - It still isn't your steering, but it changes the chassis load and dynamics in a way that lets you modify the way you steer... quite different than the OP brake + accel causing a steering input from the back end, not front end. But lots of things are different 2 wheel vs. 4 anyway.
You most definitely can. Steering is enabled by grip, and modulating the brakes at front or rear will change available grip. Every once in awhile I'll enter a corner too hot on the bike and a dab of rear brake will tighten things up.
as per other reply - you aren't steering you are settling chassis (which does affect compliance, hence grip in the sense that if you lose that you aren't able to steer). But as I said there, it's a similar enough thing I guess given all the different dynamics going on.
That's not the same effect, really. And trail braking is mostly (not exclusively) a front brake technique (in which case it's more likely reducing your turn in speed, as you really, really don't want to be on much front break and lean at the same time). It's mostly used to allow speed adjustment past the entry point without upsetting the chassis by a new application of brakes.
But I'll give you that it's vaguely similar to OP in some ways, so fair enough - cornering dynamics of 4 and 2 wheels are a bit apples and oranges anyway.
I grew up with tractors from my dad's landscaping business (old Case Construction Kings, with a PTO and farm-like attachment system rather than a backhoe). It was always funny at a worksite, when one of the college kids he'd hire needed to move a tractor out of the way. They'd get up in the seat and find this mass of unlabeled controls. There were two clutches, two brake pedals, and what looked like a regular shift lever on the floor and a regular accelerator pedal, plus all these levers they didn't recognize. They'd try to shift and it wouldn't move at all.
The floor gear shift was really just a range selector. Forward and reverse were on a shuttle lever on the steering column, and the PTO had its own transmission system, plus there was a global throttle lever in addition to the floor pedal.
Oh, and dad didn't even own a trailer. He'd drive those things on city streets at 30mph to get to jobs. It was insane in hindsight. He could have crushed a car with the bucket. And I'd ride at city street speeds sitting on a fender above an open back tire. Sheesh.
Yep. I decided to stop driving it before I drove it through a barn or something. I think the basic idea was sound, it makes the default behavior of "feet off the pedals" to stop.
The placement depends on the tractor model and make but it generally comes down to clutch on the left side, left and right brake pedal on the right side, foot accelerator either behind the brake pedals or below them. While working in the field you generally use a lever to control engine speed and as such mostly don't use the foot accelerator - other than to speed up for inclines etc.
Most tractors don't use a pedal for throttle, they use a hand lever. You've seen pilots use a similar throttle control in airplanes in movies. But there are tractors with foot throttles. We had one, the throttle was underneath the two brakes.
The two brake pedals typically look like a single pedal that's been split in half.
> Most tractors don't use a pedal for throttle, they use a hand lever. You've seen pilots use a similar throttle control
Hah, how to tell a city slicker. That makes a ton of sense though. Obviously a tractor is mostly wanting to maintain a slow but constant speed over a bumpy terrain. Having to do that with a foot pedal would be a pain.
At least I know what a PTO is, but only because of reading how dangerous they can be.
I have a few tractors around the farm, all of them have two brake pedals/levers. This even goes for the smallest of them all, an Irus U1200 two-wheel tractor with an 8 hp Hatz diesel.