THE MAKIENFELDE-Z0S8P:N HIGH-SPEED ELECTRIC 

 RAILWAY TRIALS/' 



By Dr. Alfked Gkadexwitz. 



The Marienfelde-Zossen high-speed electric-railway trials, as is 

 known, were undertaken with a view to obtaining the necessary tech- 

 nical and economical data for a regular electric-railway service up to 

 speeds as high as 200 kilometers per hour. Useful data were available 

 from previous trials made by the Siemens & Halske Company on their 

 special experimental line in Gross-Lichterfelde, near Berlin, which 

 line was intended to be a model railwaj- for operation by 10,000-volt 

 currents. It is due mainl}^ to the enterprise of the two leading electric 

 firms in Germany, the Siemens & Halske Company and the Allo-emeine 

 Elektrizitilts Gesellschaft,'^ as well as to the assistance of the most 

 important German banking firms and the authorities concerned, that 

 as early as the fall of 1899 a special concern was formed under the 

 name '"Studiengesellschaft fiir Elektrische Schnellbahnen." The 

 German railway authorities placed at the disposal of the undertaking 

 the Marienfelde-Zossen military railwa3% and two cars to be con- 

 structed respectivel}^ by the firms mentioned above were to be used 

 for the experiments. 



The Siemens & Halske Company undertook the construction of the 

 line supplying the electric power, whereas the Allgemeine P^lektrizitats 

 Gesellschaft were willing to generate the power in their Obor Schon- 

 weide electricity works as well as to construct the feeding wires thence 

 to Marienfelde-Zossen. The line was to be constructed after the 

 model of the Gross-Lichterfelde experimental track, and the same 

 arrangement of the conductors and collectors, as well as the same kind 

 of current, namely, 10,000 volts rotary current between two con- 

 ductors, was to be used. 



The Marienfelde-Zossen military line, 23 kilometers in length, 

 seemed spocialW available, as there ar(> no curves of less than 2,000 

 meters radius, the short gradients being not more than 1 : 200. The 

 permanent way, however, corresponded only with the older tj^pes of 



'^' Reprinted, by permission of the publishers, from the Engineering Magazine, 

 New York and London, Vol. XXVI, No. 4, January, 1904. Some illustrations of 

 original article are here omitted. 



''Familiarly known by the convenient abbreviation "A. E. G." 



323 



