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The RM class is the classification used by the New Zealand Railways Department (NZR) and its successors given to most railcars and railbuses that have operated on New Zealand's national rail network. As NZR and its successors has operated many diverse types of railcars, alternate names have been given to individual railcar classes. 'RM' stands for Rail Motor. == Experimental and early railcars == In the early 20th century, NZR began investigating railcar technology to provide profitable and efficient passenger services on regional routes and rural branch lines where carriage trains were not economic and "mixed" trains (passenger carriage/s attached to freight trains) were undesirably slow. However, due to New Zealand's rugged terrain and the narrow gauge of the railway network, overseas technology could not simply be directly introduced. A number of experimental railcars and railbuses were developed. * 1912: RM1 MacEwan-Pratt petrol railcar - the first railcar to operate in New Zealand * 1914: also designated RM1 Westinghouse petrol-electric railcar * 1916: RM2 Thomas Transmission petrol-electric railcar * 1924: A88 Buckhurst petrol carriage railcar (not officially a member of the RM class) * 1925: Leyland experimental petrol railcar * 1925: RM4 - RM5 Model T Ford railbus * 1925: Sentinel-Cammell steam railcar * 1926: Clayton steam railcar * 1926: Edison battery-electric railcar * 1936: RM20 - RM21 Leyland diesel railbus The most successful of the experimental and early railcars was the Edison battery-electric railcar, which provided a popular twice-daily service on the Little River Branch line in Canterbury. It may have been expanded into a full fleet of railcars had the economic difficulties of the Great Depression not intervened, and it was destroyed by a depot fire in 1934 and not replaced. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「NZR RM class」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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