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Tractor-trailers do almost 100% of all U. S. inter-city highway hauling today. A few months ago the Fruehauf brothers got the job of national distributor for the stainless steel trailers of Budd Manufacturing Co., gave an initial order for 10,000 stainless steel semitrailer body sets. On the market and doing nicely is Fruehauf's new light-weight Aerovan (of aluminum alloy) which, carrying a ten-ton payload, weighs three-quarters of a ton less than Fruehauf's equivalent steel model of last year. One growing reason for reducing trailer weights: many a local highway regulation...
Well aware that streamliner speed would appeal to the railroads' customers, light-train builders like Budd and Pullman cannily concentrated their major sales appeal on coach-passenger comforts. To get average travelers out of automobiles and buses, they made roomier cars (50 seats instead of 80), softened upholstery, improved lighting, prettied washrooms and advocated stewardesses, an idea which the airlines had already exploited. The record of Santa Fe's El Capitans proved that this was good salesmanship: first full month of their operation (March 1938) they turned in a revenue of $38,000; four months later...
Most distinctive hallmark of the streamline-builders is the sleek, shiny gleam of Budd trains. Only Budds are made of stainless steel and only Budds are likely to be, as long as the Philadelphia plant keeps a tight hold on its "Shotweld" process for welding stainless sheets together. Invented by Budd's Chief Engineer Colonel Earl James Wilson Ragsdale, onetime professional Army officer, the "Shotweld" machine is a foolproof, delicately balanced electrical device that can be operated by unskilled labor. In less than the winking of an eye (1/20 of a second) it sends a stabbing electric current through...
Pullman, No. 1 streamline-builder, today has about 1,000 lightweight cars on the rails (Budd 300). As its basic material Pullman alternates between aluminum alloy, which has about the same strength as stainless, and Cor-Ten, U. S. Steel's patented alloy. Cor-Ten's elastic strength is only about twice carbon steel's, and Cor-Ten cars are heavier than stainless or aluminum, but Pullman's steel cost is much lower than Budd's. Cor-Ten cars are spot-welded, but since aluminum cannot be structurally welded, Pullman does a sleek riveting...
...manufacturers of gleaming streamliners can see even brighter days ahead. Railroad operating revenues are on the upgrade and the railroads are again buying equipment to replace rolling stock run ragged during the depression. With 1939's financial statement yet to be issued, Edward Budd well knew last week that after a net loss of $400,937 in 1938 (1937's net profit was $3,010,000) his company was back in the black again. Much of the credit went to the streamline train division...