Weitzer Railmotor

The Weitzer railmotor was among the first self propelled railcars fitted with internal combustion engines to be produced in significant numbers in Europe, built by the Hungarian firm J. Weitzer Engine and Waggon Building and Iron Casting Joint Stock Company starting in 1903, with series production underway by 1906 and cars remaining in service until around 1960. It used a petrol electric drivetrain, in which a four cylinder petrol engine from De Dion Bouton rated between fifty and seventy horsepower drove an electric generator that in turn powered underfloor traction motors of thirty horsepower each supplied by Siemens Schuckert, mounted at both axles, giving the railcar a top speed of sixty to seventy kilometers per hour and the ability to haul up to two lightweight trailers. Roughly sixty five railmotors and forty trailers were sold in total, built to three different track gauges, standard gauge for the majority of the order along with smaller batches of eleven units each for metre gauge and for the narrower Bosnian gauge of seven hundred sixty millimeters.