A gas engine on the rails

The ME5 motor vehicle carried a petrol engine to the rails. The publication on the museum located its construction in the Santa Apolónia workshops in 1948. In the same collection, it describes a steam locomotive manufactured in Germany in 1908.

The dates are forty years and allow comparing two technologies. They are dates of construction of vehicles, not of arrival at the station. The collection gathers pieces from various origins; being in the museum does not show, by itself, where each one circulated.

The Basto Land Museum identifies the engine as Chevrolet and describes the passenger space: 11 first-class seats, 16 third-class and other 16 standing, as well as sanitary facilities. The 27 seating positions shall not be confused with all available positions.

The National Railway Museum explains that a single motor vehicle sought to reduce the costs of operation in lines of low traffic, bringing together functions that required a composition. The project, directed by the engineer Vasco Viana, took advantage of characteristics of road transport. The same record says that the use of gasoline proved costly and led to temporary or extraordinary uses.

The inventory adds a link to the local history: this ME5 will have circulated in the Line of Tâmega. The formulation is prudent and so remains. It is a specific documentary track, different from deducing the circulation just because the vehicle is in the collection today.