In the immediate post-war years, the Bohn Aluminum and Brass Company commissioned renderings of a number of futuristic transportation concepts that were likely to use more of the materials they sold. Just how this thing was supposed to actually turn with all those rear axles was obviously not part of the artist’s bailiwick. Here’s the other one:
image source: Plan59
I love artwork like this, even though the artist does not factor much real life into his concepts. Although I love the plexiglass roofs on the trailers in the second photo, I cannot imagine any freight company that would assign personnel to wash the inside of the trailer windows. And you certainly could not transport milk in them in the summer, unless instant hot milk was in demand somewhere.
Maybe part of the artist’s concept is a system of roads that never require more than a 5 degree turn. Also, I love the under-bridge lighting – no more dark tunnels. All the better to see what is in those glass-ceilinged trailers, I guess.
Great pictures.
If the driver is about 6 ft tall, that would make the height of those rigs 20-30 feet off the ground. Also, I believe the limit in length for a trailer is 53 feet (at least on the east coast).
You can blue sky the future all you want, but stupid isn’t going to cut it.
At this point in time, as the interstate system was first being constructed, the idea of turning would have been a moot point. The roads were straight, any turns had huge sweeping curves, and development was built to accomodate such dream rigs. Basically, it’s a train on tires.
With all that said, it’s a very cool dream. I wonder what kind of cows this dairy must use, because that’s alot of milk!
While the interstates could be built to possibly accommodate such a rig you still have to get off the interstate to get to the farm and plant. Since the tanker trucks are not refrigerated the milk usually doesn’t travel that far making a super huge tanker a little difficult. I guess they could have a large number of fill ports and drains so that it didn’t take longer than the trip to load or unload the product.
You’re not thinking in the same frame of mind that these designers and planners did. I don’t like in their world either.
They didn’t care about that in their proposals, you move the farm and the plant to the interstate. Take a look at what Robert Moss had planned for NYC, it was all planned around the flow of traffic and the ease of use for the driver. Everything else could be wiped out and rebuilt to accomodate.
Like I said, it was all about dreaming the next big thing after rebuilding Europe.
I love renderings like these! They remind me of old Popular Mechanics and Popular Science magazine covers from the mid 50s into the 60s.
These old illustrations of an optimistic future crack me up – I’m still whining about where my flying car is!
An old issue of TRAINS magazine from the 1950’s had a similar illustration of an artist’s conception of an Auto-Train where the cars were on open, two-level platforms and the family could sit in them at will or just stand along the minimal side rails speeding along, presumably on the Santa Fe Railroad where it appears the train is going about 75 mph, impervious to any danger of flying rocks from the ballast (it happens – I’ve seen it) or falling off the car!
Seeing these now just make me shake my head and laugh.
reminds me of this weird bus i saw in norway last summer. the back half of the bus is a refrigerated storage compartment that delivers produce, etc. to the local supermarkets in the fjord region. pretty clever, actually.
Nah, that’s just the area where the bowling alley, swimming pool, formal dining room and piano bar are located!
See: “The Big Bus” from 1976.
The second pic in the article reminded me of that movie.
Greyhound converted about 100 of its classic Scenicruisers into “Combo Cars”, where the front lower section was for maybe a dozen passengers, and the raised rear area was converted for express package delivery. I used to see them come through Iowa City in the early seventies.
Like NZR freight bus back when all freight was mandated to the railway parcel freight went by bus depot to destination a better way of losing stuff has yet to be devised NZ rail could lose anything now the freight industry is private of course it works much the same freight sorters are literacy tested and a fail gets the job. All freight moves about on trucks and high speed freight buses are an unremembered piece of the past.
I had the unpleasant opportunity to ride in the luggage area of one of these owned by Trailways half way through Canada when our regular bus broke down. we were issued blankets and given a refund.
I keep thinking of rhe Mammoth Car from “Speed Racer.”
http://speedrally.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/speed_racer_mammoth_car_angle.jpg
Great renderings the bong would still have warm when the print run was done. They of course bear no ressemblance of anything that could be driven on roads but thats the point of concepts.
Looking at these pictures reminds me of refrigerator design from the same era (esp. the interiors). I saved a N.O.S. replacement plastic drawer front that came out of a neighbor’s shed when I was growing up because it looks so cool.
And you keep your milk in the refrigerator, so there’s the link . . .
What, you mean Aussie road trains don’t look like that?
Apart from the Art-Deco styling, a large number of trucks here are very similar to the second one, with the exception of having the turntable for the second trailer mounted on the rear end of the first trailer rather than on a steerable bogie or dolly (looking at it again the same applies to the connection between tractor unit and first trailer), what is called a B-Double (B train configuration, double trailers) and is limited to approx 90′ long and 200,000lb. Then there are the road trains that are restricted to rural areas of mainland states except Victoria and typically have 3 standard semi trailers that use a dolly to connect to the one in front (A train configuration). Of course there are some exceptions etc too…
Nobody has mentioned the steerable bogie under the front of the first truck, with the driver located in a cab on the main body of the truck. In 1945 there was a bus along these lines built in Australia, called the Landliner and built for Peninsula Bus Lines servicing the area south of Melbourne. The idea was to use the full length of the vehicle for the cabin which was of course not possible with a semi-trailer bus, combined with better maneuverability than traditional rigid bus. The power bogie could also be swapped out for maintenance without taking the bus off the road.
The bus was 45′ long, 8′ wide and could seat 80 people in metropolitan seating layout. It had two Ford V8 engines, one in the front bogie and one driving the rear axle, through 4 speed gearboxes and 2 speed axles, the rear having a free-wheel so that the engine would idle until power was needed for gradients or heavy loads. The power bogie could turn 100 degrees in either direction.
The steering was hydraulic, which was problematic given 1940’s technology and virtual experimental status, and the ultimate reason the bus was converted to tow behind a prime mover (tractor unit). Gear shifting was via mechanical linkage (the mind boggles…) and brakes were hydraulic with an emergency breakaway system for the trailer. Cruising speed was stated as 45mph.
The bus was refused renewal of registration by the Victorian government, and sold to the WA government railways in 1946. Two more updated buses called the Cheetah were also supplied to WA in early 1948. The conversion to a trailer was done in late 1948, and the 3 buses remained in service until the early 1960’s.
http://i212.photobucket.com/albums/cc90/systemimprover/1.jpg
Edit, not sure what I did wrong to not make the picture appear, but it does seem to be a link a least
Now that’s an awesome bus. I’ve seen pictures of a lot of unusual bus configurations, but that’s a new one for me. Thanks.
The semi-trailer maker Strick experimented with a cab-under tractor in the late 70s with the driver sitting at a low sports car height with 9in of ground clearance. The project died after they made two prototypes and Hoffa Sr stated that no Teamster would ever operate one.
I remember that, they looked kind of like some of the airport tugs
The Cabunder: http://www.stricktrailers.com/history.aspx
My father was still driving trucks back then, I remember his comments were something to the effect of “what happens to the driver in collisions?”
I don’t know that I would want to be under a trailer during a collision.
Boeing has a number of “cab-under” trailer dollies used for moving airplane fuselages and the like from one plant to another. The plane is strapped to the main truck at the front and then a cab-under truck at the rear. The driver or pilot of the rear truck, dolly, or what every you want to call it, sits in a semi-reclined position as low as the lowest ricer on the road. It has a steer axle and tandem rears and it isn’t much longer than a reg cab pickup.
With all the comments about the axles…nobody knows or recalls the number of jack-axles on dump trucks required in some uses in Michigan.
http://www.dieseltrucksales.net/trucks/PO-5541a-1.JPG
Granted, some of them are, in some installations, retractable. In answer to the question by deriders, that rig would steer. It would also scrub tires to where wear would be a major expense.
Anyone seeing a tractor-trailer execute a tight turn would understand that…with some tractors, the turn is sharp enough that the trailer actually pivots on the rear tandems. Leaves an impressive skid, but it turns.
The “Millipede” equipment configurations for some states are surreal, with enough axles they allow 70-90k lbs in a relatively short span. Some of the MI steel haulers where the entire trailer is axles are just silly.
Part of my training at CWX circa 2006 was how to deliberately jack-knife my equipment and execute a pivot U-turn; if you don’t mind scrubbing the tires you can get turned around in a bit less then the length of the trailer alone.
Good point, that truck you posted is similar to some concrete agitators & dump trucks here, except the second axle would be a second steer axle with single wheel and closer to the front axle. I expect on that layout you would nearly welcome tractor style turn/fiddle brakes, on a damp road 2 tyres are going to struggle to influence 16 heavily loaded ones! I suppose lifting the second axle would soon fix that…
So Semi Trucks were all based on the GM Futurliner?
http://www.futurliner.com/
If you ever order the DVD for the Futurliner, you’ll be handling some of my work. My old printing company did the sleeves for the DVDs. Zeeland, MI is about 15 miles from here, and I got to speak with the project manager a couple of times concerning the restoration.
I’ve seen #10 (the Michigan restored one) several times, the most recent being at the old Grand Rapids GM Metal (Stamping) Plant back in the Fall of 2008, not too long before it was shuttered.
Looking at the pics again, especially the first one reminds me of an article in a 1982 TRAINS magazine article about Hitler’s super railway designed by Albert Speer which would be gigantic even by today’s standards, which, of course, was never built.