Rapide Nord car

“Rapide Nord” cars (meaning Nord's fast cars) are metallic cars with bogies used in Nord company's fast trains (Nord is one of the French old rail companies before the creation of SNCF in 1938) then used by SNCF.

These cars are made of welded thick steel sheets in order to ensure their resistance, which is much better than that of wooden cars. This construction process comes from ship building. It is different from other metallic cars of the same period which are usually riveted instead of being welded.

Rapide Nord cars were built between 1928 and 1938 for Nord company and then used by SNCF in the whole of France. The last car was retired in 1984.

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