Explosive vehicle

Sprinklers , even water Sprengwagen , spraying cars , water injection cars , water trucks or Spülwagen called, are municipal special vehicles for irrigation of urban roads. They are available on the basis of rail vehicles as well as on the basis of road vehicles . Today, explosive wagons are rarely used. Today, rail-bound sprinklers are primarily used to control vegetation , i.e. to prevent weed formation in the track area using herbicides .

history

In earlier decades, in times of low rainfall, explosive vehicles ensured dust-free roads, especially the unpaved roads with natural pavement that were common at the time . Their use was primarily for preventive health care , and the sprinkling made the subsequent street cleaning easier . For children and adolescents, the passing of an explosive vehicle was often a major attraction. They were filled up using hydrants on the way . In Düsseldorf, for example, street sprinkling began in 1871, and in some parts of the city center it was sprinkled up to eight times a day.

Road vehicles

Road-bound explosive vehicles today are mostly specially constructed trucks , i.e. tankers . Previously it was horse carts or horse carts . In addition to their actual purpose, road-bound explosive vehicles were also used by the fire brigade as a fire truck if necessary . They were also used to irrigate green spaces.

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  Horse and cart from the 19th century

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  Explosive vehicles as an attraction, here in Kiel in 1905

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  Truck explosives in Karl-Marx-Stadt

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  Modern explosive truck

Tram cars

Rail-bound explosive vehicles operate as work vehicles on the track network of the city tram . In the early years, these were often four-axle bogie cars . These could carry the heavy weight of the water tanks better than the two-axle vehicles that were common in the past. In addition to simple sidecars - which were constructed similar to a tank wagon - there were also self-propelled explosive units . Typically the explosive wagons used in the tram network were not owned by the respective transport company , but belonged to the city. Often these special vehicles therefore did not have a company number. In other cases, although they belonged to the transport companies, they operated on behalf of and for the account of the municipality.

For example, a Hanover tram truck introduced in 1913 could hold six times as much water as a corresponding street vehicle at that time. In addition, an electric motor kept the water under pressure, which made it possible to achieve a jet width of up to 15 meters and thus also to sprinkle wide and long streets in a short time.

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  Non-self-propelled explosive device with control station on the Mendrisio tram , built in 1911

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  Historic explosive unit from the city of Biel , built in 1915

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  Museum received explosives railcars Bogestra with closed cabs, built in 1914

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  Explosive wagon with central driver's cab of the Brno tram

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  More modern explosive unit based on Tatra T4 on the Kaliningrad tram

See also

• Explosive units of the Timișoara tram
• water cannon

Web links

Commons : Street sprinklers  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Explosive vehicles in the Lexicon of All Technology from 1904
• Explosive vehicle in Meyer's Large Conversation Lexicon from 1905

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Alexander Schulte: Garbage collection and street cleaning from 1862 - streets were sprinkled eight times. In: Westdeutsche Zeitung. March 9, 2012.
2. ↑ Fire trucks of the Ratingen fire brigade
3. ↑ The history of the Speyer fire brigade ( Memento of the original from July 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
4. ↑ A tram as an explosive vehicle. On: karleduardskanal.wordpress.com.