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Epoch III

Introduction
A new start
The first trains after the war
The first network of long-distance trains
Moving forward, more trains, more comfort, more regularity
Pre war rolling stock again in service
The start of an international long-distance network
The blue network of fast express trains
The modern era, the rise of electric locomotives
The modern diesel locomotive is coming
A new class of coaches
The third class is abandoned
The last new steam engine
A new prestious network, the Trans Europ Express
The Rheingold, from 1962 again exclusive
A new star on rails, the electric locomotive E 03

Pre war rolling stock again in service

Already before the DB was officially founded the Reichsbahn West inventory all rolling stock which was present in the Western zones. Most of the rolling stock was damaged or completely destroyed. Many rolling stock was repaired or recovered because it was the only solution to get some decent rolling stock. Money for new rolling stock was of course not available.

The Reichsbahn West made the following inventory of rolling stock as far as the long-distance traffic is concerned. Overview of all locomotives of epoch II which were in service at the DB in the long-distance trains after the second world war (Overview of DRG epoch II locomotives in service in epoch III with the DB). Overview of all trainsets which were suitable for long-distance services (Overview of DRG epoch II trainsets in service in epoch III with the DB). And the overview of all pre war coaches of epoch II which went into service in epoch III in long-distance trains (Overview of DRG epoch II coaches in epoch III at the DB).

In the first years of the DB the type indication of coaches was the same as used before the war in epoch II, only a couple of letters were added to the type scheme. Also almost all coach numbers remains unchanged. Here is an overview of all letters as used until 1956 at the DB (Overview of letter indications in epoch III). The capital letters were mostly followed by a small letter, here is an overview of all small letters (Overview of small letter indications in epoch III). The following numbering scheme was used until 1956 for coaches ().

With these letter and numbering schemes, they get the following indications of coaches, with for example a 1st/2st class coach of Bauart 1928 from epoch II: AB4ü-28. AB means 1st and 2st class, the number 4 indicates the numbers of axles and ü means that the coach is provided with old style corridors between two coaches. The numbers remained the same compared with the numbering scheme of epoch II.

The number of axles was only indicated when it was not 2. The year of construction of the first coaches of that type was added at the back of the indication. So you get AB4ü-28. The indications of pre war coaches were not changed in principle, they were going unchanged over to the DB administration after the war. Of course the numbers and indications were changed when the coaches were rebuilt or modified. New coaches were numbered according to the above mentioned schemes.