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Motor Rail was a British locomotive-building company, based in Bedford. In 1987 loco manufacture ceased, and the business line sold to Alan Keef Ltd of Ross-on-Wye, who continue to provide spares and have built several locos to Motor Rail designs. ==History== Formed in 1911 as The Motor Rail & Tramcar Co Ltd, the company built petrol and diesel-engined locomotives, mainly for narrow gauge railways. In January 1916, the company answered a War Department tender for military supply railways. The specification was for a gauge locomotive, with no more than 1ton of axle load per axle, capable of hauling up to 15tons at .〔 The company designed a new locomotive, based around a square-set but with outer longitudinal "bent-rail" frame, mounted on two axles. The 2JO petrol engine manufactured by W.H.Dorman & Co of Stafford was centre-set longitudinally in the frame. This resultantly required the operator to sit above the engine facing to one side of the design, to enable mounting of the engine and Dixon-Abbott patent gearbox, which drove the unsprung axles through a chain-drive. The water cooling radiator was mounted to the nominal front of the locomotive, and a large fly wheel gave relatively smooth operation. A second but armoured version was made to a specification defined by the Ministry of Munitions. This used an upgraded Dorman 4JO 40HP engine and two speed gearbox, coming in three versions:〔 *Open: armoured end plates plus height-adjustable canopy on pillars *Protected: as Open, plus armoured side doors and visors *Armoured: completely enclosed with armour-plated roof, and end slits for the driver to look through With over 900 such locomotives supplied to the WD and MoM, post-WW1 the resultantly large and cheap supply of these trench tractors opened up the use of internal combustion engine powered locomotives to many new and existing applications, where steam engines were either too heavy, too expensive or allowed cheaper operations. The trade name Simplex was used from the early days, and in 1972 the company was renamed Simplex Mechanical Handling Ltd.〔http://www.mrt.org.uk/simplex/〕 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「Motor Rail」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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