Express mail train
The express mail train was a project of the German Federal Post Office at the beginning of the 1950s, with which the mail transport by rail should be accelerated.
Starting position
At the beginning of the 1950s, mail in land transport was transported over medium and long distances by rail ( rail mail ). For this there were rail mail cars or rail mail compartments in scheduled trains of the German Federal Railroad . In addition, parcels were transported in express freight trains in our own freight cars .
In order to speed up the transport of mail by rail, own mail trains should run at a maximum speed of 120 km / h.
development
In an initial concept, work was carried out to develop a corresponding diesel multiple unit , analogous to the DB series VT 10.5, which was conceived at the same time . In 1951, there was a design from the office of express transport pioneer Franz Kruckenberg . This envisaged a four-unit multiple unit in which the vehicle sections were each supported on a common axle, as was later implemented with the VT 10 501 .
At the German Transport Exhibition in 1953 , however, a different concept was presented: three specially equipped rail mail cars and the " most modern diesel locomotive [...] in Germany " The locomotive was supposed to run in the middle of the train and each of the rail mail cars had a driver's cab at each end, as is usual with control cars is equipped. The cars could also be added to any train made up of individual cars . They were available in three versions, each equipped differently for:
- Correspondence,
- Transport of parcels and parcels,
- Correspondence, parcels and packages.
The wagons were 26.4 m long and weighed between 33 and 37 t when empty . The load weight was 25 t. They ran on bogies of the Minden-Deutz type . In the carts in which letters were sorted there was a system that sucked out dusty air. The wagons had been commissioned by the Deutsche Bundespost and were developed by the Central Post Office in Darmstadt , the Deutsche Bundesbahn and the railway vehicle manufacturers Waggonfabrik Uerdingen , Waggonfabrik Gebrüder Credé and Hansa Waggonbau .
It is not known that this express mail train will be used beyond the presentation at the transport exhibition.
literature
- Heinz Kurz: The VT 10.5 series . EK-Verlag, Freiburg 2016, ISBN 978-3-8446-6025-8 .
- Emil Maurer (Editor): German Transport Exhibition - Official Catalog . Carl Gabler, Munich 1953.
Remarks
- ↑ Maurer: Deutsche Verkehrsausstellung , p. 89, speaks of " special postal trains ".
- ↑ This is probably a class V 200 locomotive .