Japanese Rail Car Nomenclature (KuHa, SaHa, MoHa, KiHa)

[kvp]

 

Well in case anyone's interested, for comparison's sake, here's the Mantetsu info for the system used from 1938-1945. Sentetsu's system from 1938-1945 was nearly identical.

Shouldn't this better be forked off into a Korean thread? Just to keep new people from confusing it with the JNR/JR system used in Japan?

[Pashina12]

Maybe? Though would fit better under "Japanese-controlled areas" or somesuch, not just specifically Korea. Either way, can be moved if yous see fit or deleted, just thought it relevant to the general theme here since the passenger/freight car part at least is most definitely related.

[Pashina12]

On some freight cars I've been seeing the type classification preceded by a smaller, superscript kana, like for example "(o)HoKi"... what does this signify?

[miyakoji]

On some freight cars I've been seeing the type classification preceded by a smaller, superscript kana, like for example "(o)HoKi"... what does this signify?

 

I don't think I've ever noticed this, can you post a link?

[Pashina12]

Here's just a few:

 

oHoKi 8300 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%82%A4%E3%83%AB:Hoki8300.JPG
oHoKi 9300 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%82%A4%E3%83%AB:Hoki9300.JPG
akoTaSa 5609 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%82%A4%E3%83%AB:Tasa5609.JPG
aTaMu 8000 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%82%A4%E3%83%AB:Tamu8000.JPG
koToRa 90552 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%95%E3%82%A1%E3%82%A4%E3%83%AB:JNR-Tora-90552.jpg

[miyakoji]

Here's just a few:

 

oHoKi 8300 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ファイル:Hoki8300.JPG

oHoKi 9300 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ファイル:Hoki9300.JPG

akoTaSa 5609 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ファイル:Tasa5609.JPG

aTaMu 8000 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ファイル:Tamu8000.JPG

koToRa 90552 - https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ファイル:JNR-Tora-90552.jpg

 

Cool, this is new to me.

 

The first few examples on this page, http://mawasya-tetudo.main.jp/keishiki-fc-hoper.html say that the 'o' prefix is due to the cars exceeding 12m, so the prefix must stand for 大

 

This is supported by the small chart at the bottom of this page: http://highland.hakuba.ne.jp/~natsume/kamotsu/kigoujrf.htm

 

A ア - a tank car with an aluminum body

O オ - in the case of ToKi cars, it has a capacity of 36 tons

O オ - in the case of TaKi cars, it exceeds 16 meters

O オ - in the case of HoKi cars, it exceeds 12 meters

Ko コ - in the case of TaSa and TaKi cars, it is less than 12 meters long

Ha ハ - in the case of WaMu cars, it's a WaMu that is 1.2 times the length of a regular WaMu (?) :)

Ro ロ - a (freight) car that cannot exceed 65km/h

 

In the case of the AKoTaSa, I'm assuming they are using two prefixes at once.  At this point, I should have left well enough alone , but I proceeded down the rabbit hole and found two more charts:

 

http://cortina.hakuba.ne.jp/~natsume/kamotsu/kigouS3.htm

https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/国鉄貨車の車両形式#.E7.89.B9.E6.AE.8A.E6.A8.99.E8.A8.98.E7.AC.A6.E5.8F.B7

The wikipedia page and this one seem to say something else about the HaWaMu: http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q1474290679

 

I googled '貨車　表す記号' to find these.  Enjoy :)

[Nick_Burman]

 

Ere - Memorial (I have no idea what this means but I'm guessing these are cars used to transport dead soldiers?)

 

 

Possibly a Funeral car.

 

Cheers NB

[Sheffie]

Has anyone figured out what a Tsumu car is? I mean, if I wrote it down right, it's a ventilated box car, but I saw "Tsu" on the previous page listed as meaning "sand car" so I'm confused

[Kiha66]

"Tsu" is correct for ventilated box car.  Sand car could have been a mistranslation or the kanji could have been reused as naming changed over the years.
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/通風車

[Pashina12]

On 1/18/2019 at 6:34 PM, Sheffie said:

Has anyone figured out what a Tsumu car is? I mean, if I wrote it down right, it's a ventilated box car, but I saw "Tsu" on the previous page listed as meaning "sand car" so I'm confused

 

Sorry about that - "Tsu" for sand cars was used only by the South Manchuria Railway and Chosen Government Railway in Japanese-occupied Korea. TsuMu in the JNR/JR sense is indeed a ventilated boxcar.