The boxcars formed the most numerous classes of the freight cars in Hungary. In 1918 almost 40'000 boxcars were in stock. A small portion of them were the large volume Gh cars with cornered roof and the round roof Gp types and even a few 8-wheeled cars. But these were not more than a few thousand altogether. The number of standard boxcars exceeded more than 90% of the total.
In Hungary from the very early times the freight cars were constructed with a steel chassis. The box, however, was a pure wooden structure. In order to make it solid, the walls were made with a dual layer. The external layer consisted of vertical planking while the internal planks were 45 degree diagonally mounted. Both layers were nailed together forming a stiff structure. Such a car van be observed on the old photo as the first and fourth car of the train on the closer rail.
In the late 1880s the car construction technology was changed for steel reinforced superstructures. This was made by L-corner bars and U-profiles on both the front walls and the sides. These cars were only built with a single layer wooden wall, the planking was horizontal. Only the sliding doors were made with vertical planking.
These cars, as well as their predecessors the all-wood constructions had a wheelbase of 3.7m (12') and a box length of 7.2m (23'7"). In the early 1890s the design was changed again and the newer cars had 4.0m (13') wheelbase and 7.5m (25') body length. The majority of these cars were built without any brake, a part of them with handbrake. The brakeman had a platform at one end of the car which was covered by the roof projection. No other protection was available.
Form 1915 on the construction changed again. The wheelbase increased to 5m (16'5") in order to increase the speed limit for these cars. With this the chassis design changed basically. The superstructure, however, did not change. Only the handbraked version differed from the earlier ones, as now a real small cab was mounted on the braking platform. With this, the roof extension disappeared.
There was another version of these boxcars which was made for transport of blessed soldiers. These cars had a frontside door and extra windows on the sliding doors.
The last versoin of the standard boxcars was built in large numbers during WW1 and also after the war, until 1926. Due to lacking finances the construction of boxcars stopped, and a few years later, during the World Economic Crise no cars were purchased at all. After this time newer, more modern cars were designed.
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This page was updated last time on February 5th 2005
© János Erö
