:Cincinnati Car Company

{{Infobox company

| name = Cincinnati Car Company

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| image = 19660813 05 C&LE 119 Ohio Railway Museum-3 (8682437478).jpg

| image_caption = C&LE #119, one of the famed "Red Devils", at the Ohio Railway Museum in 1966

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| type = Private

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| industry = Streetcar builder

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| foundation = Cincinnati, Ohio ({{start date|1902}})

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| defunct = {{end date|1938}}

| location_city = Cincinnati, Ohio

| location_country = USA

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The Cincinnati Car Company or Cincinnati Car Corporation was a subsidiary of the Ohio Traction Company. It designed and constructed interurban cars, streetcars (trams) and (in smaller scale) buses. It was founded in 1902 in Cincinnati, Ohio. In 1928, it bought the Versare Car Company.

Products

The company was among the first to make lightweight cars. Its chief engineer Thomas Elliot designed the curved-side car, a lightweight model that used curved steel plates (not conventional flat steel plates) in body construction. Instead of the floor, the side plates and side sills bore the bulk of the weight load. Longitudinal floor supports were no longer needed, which made the cars lighter than conventional cars. The first cars of this type were sold in 1922.{{cite web

| title =Historical Sketch" in "Cincinnati Car Corporation Collection, 1902-1931; 1965, Collection Guide | publisher =Indiana Historical Society | date =2000-09-20 | url =http://www.indianahistory.org/our-collections/collection-guides/cincinnati-car-corporation-p-0376.pdf | accessdate =2012-11-05}} For instance, the Red Devil weighted only {{convert|22|ST|LT t|1}}.J.L. Koffmann (April 1980). "Der Rollenstromabnehmer in Amerika [The Trolley Pole in America]". {{Interlanguage link multi|Stadtverkehr{{!}} Der Stadtverkehr|de|3=Stadtverkehr (Zeitschrift)}}, pp. 182–184. Curved-side cars were also called "Balanced Lightweight Cars".

In 1929, the company designed new lightweight partially aluminum low profile high-speed coaches for the electrified Cincinnati and Lake Erie Railroad interurban that operated between Cincinnati, Dayton, and Toledo. Twenty were purchased, painted bright red, and called Red Devils by the C&LE. These interurban cars, whose open country speed could reach {{convert|90|mph|km/h|abbr=on}}, were a forerunner of today's high-speed trains. Both the carbodies and new design small wheel low riding trucks were well adapted for high-speed running on light rail rough track. In 1939, the C&LE abandoned operation, and the Red Devils were sold to the Cedar Rapids and Iowa City Railway (CRANDIC) in Iowa and the Lehigh Valley Transit Company in Pennsylvania. They continued to operate successfully and well into the 1950s.William D. Middleton (1961). [https://archive.org/stream/interurbanera00midd/interurbanera00midd_djvu.txt The Interurban Era], Kalmbach Publishing Co.

Preserved cars

Cincinnati Car Company ceased operations in 1938, but several of its original streetcars are preserved, for instance at the Saskatchewan Railway Museum, Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal and the Seashore Trolley Museum.

:Cincinnati Car Company

Products

Preserved cars

See also

References

Further reading