Early Japanese film on Shinkansen

softwerkslex · **Posted:** Fri Nov 12, 2021 8:05 am

This is worth a look. 1960s documentary on the construction of the Shinkansen.

At 11:20, there is a cab car body on meter gauge shop trucks being shunted by a steam locomotive at the construction works.

https://youtu.be/Afu9clEUinQ

EJ Berry · **Posted:** Sat Nov 13, 2021 12:42 am

Interesting. Tokaido Shinkansen started operation in 1964, in time for the Olympic Games. Shinkansen gauge is 1435 mm (4' 8 1/2")

In 1970 I was in northern Honshu and Hokkaido photographing D51 2-8-2's on local passenger trains. JNR gauge is 1067 mm (3' 6")

The single Shinkansen car in the video closely resembles the propeller driven Zeppelin railcar "Schienenzeppelin" of Germany's DRG in 1929-1939. Power was initially by 2 BMW 6-cylinder gas engines, later by one BMW 12-cylinder gas engine. It was not duplicated.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schienenzeppelin

Phil Mulligan