David (Michelangelo)

In the railway jargon , one distinguishes usually two great types of towed vehicles. One speaks about coaches for the goods and about cars for the travellers. (even if certain historical vehicles, those of CIWL - International Company of the Sleeping cars and Large the Express train Europeans -, raised the name of sleeping car and restaurant car ).

The coaches are the vehicles towed (sometimes thorough) by a Locomotive and specialized in goods transport and in cattle. The term is enough general and recovers a large variety of forms.

Covered dishes, tipcarts and

At the origin of the railroad, the companies used three categories of coaches, inspired of the horse-drawn vehicles which they were to replace. These three types formed the essence of their park:

the Covered truck, for the goods having to be protected from the bad weather, opening by sliding doors and provided with openings of ventilation; this coach was used with transport of all types as goods conditioned or not, like with the transport of the live animals (without speaking about the trains of deportation of sad memory);
the Flat wagon, provided with folding edges or peg ladder S, being used with the transport of all types as goods not fearing the bad weather (but one can cover them), in particular rails, vehicles, barks, pipes, etc;
the Gondola car, provided with fixed walls, but discovered, being able to be covered, being used with transport as materials in bulk, ballast, coal, ore, scrap, etc

These three basic types are always in circulation, but thereafter appeared specialized coaches, better adapted to the goods transport particular, and which in the beginning were put in circulation by privately held companies offering them in hiring or by industrialists for their own transport.

Some specialized types

Coach kangaroo carry-trucks for travelling road, their name comes from the central pocket where the trailer is placed;
Coach carry-cars, with one or two levels (three with the the United States, where the Gabarit in height of the lines allows it);
refrigerated van, covers cooling or Isothermal S, recognizable with their white color;
coach Hopper for the transport of materials in bulk, with axial unloading (between the rail) or side, for coal, construction materials, ores, etc… ;
coaches silos with pneumatic handling for products in powder form, (cement, talc, etc);
tank car first type specialized with the transport of liquids, mainly of wine, disappeared with the arrival from the rail tanker;
Tank car, specialized according to the type of liquid products (containing hydrocarbon, liquid gases, chlorine, etc);
coach torpedoes, or coach pocket, for fused metals;
coach with sliding roof (gondola car equipped with a sliding roof);
coach carry-barks, with reinforced peg ladders great height;
coach with mechanical covering, covered trucks often of great capacity equipped to facilitate handling;
coach with sliding walls, covered trucks equipped for palletized loadings;
Coach for exceptional transport, provided with many axles to distribute the load;
coach desk, with inclined floor, for transport of very broad parts;
coach carries container, also called coach beam, or skeleton, having pawns of anchoring for the transport of limp;
coach with interchangeable axles, for the traffic with the Iberian peninsula;
coach with reduced gauge, adapted to the English gauge, less higher than the European gauge;
etc

Alternative distinctions

One can also distinguish the coaches according to their number of axles:

coach with two axles, standard more running until about 1950;
coach with Bogie S; this coach, of bigger size, fits better in the curves; the modern coaches are generally with Bogie S. the first coaches of this type were American;
coach “millepede” for exceptional transport;
articulated coach, made of at least two platforms fixed one at the other by an articulation. It is often the case of the coaches of transport of cars, with two platforms and three axles;

One can distinguish them according to their legal status:

coach network, pertaining to a railroad company;
coach of private individual, pertaining to an independent company, customer of the railroad or professional hirer out.

These categories tend to grow blurred with the progressive opening of the networks to competition.

Those whose denomination depends on their place:

tail coach, or van, (the last coach of the train, called “caboose” on the American networks, it was formerly equipped with a manual greenhouse-brake kept by an agent).

See too

Car of railroad
Classification of the coaches and cars of railroad

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