Zephyr Patents (original) (raw)

The US Patent and Trademark Office has completed scanning all US patents (over 70 million pages, nearly 4 terabytes!) and they are available online at the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office website.

Unfortunately, patents earlier than December 1975 are only searchable by patent number and classification, and not title, inventor, asssignee, etc.

I have been able to find some of the patents issued for the Pioneer Zephyr and other shovelnoses. (Thank you to Philip Hom for alerting me to the patents marked with an "*".) These were all assigned to the Budd Company (it is best to right-click and "save to file" for each patent):

The Shotweld patent:
1,944,106 Method and Product of Electric Welding - Jan. 16, 1934
Railcar (apparently the the Budd-Michelin):
2,129,235 Rail Car Body - Sept. 6, 1938
Truck structure:
2,132,001 Rail Car Truck - Oct. 4, 1938
2,136,733 Rail Car Truck - Nov. 13, 1938 *
Carbody, underframe, articulation and diaphragm:
2,150,130 Removable Paneling - Mar. 7, 1939 *
2,168,995 Diaphragm Construction - Aug. 8, 1939 *
2,171,425 Vehicle Construction - Aug. 29, 1939
2,171,434 Beam-Type Housing Structure - Aug. 29, 1939 *
2,185,976 Underframe - Jan. 2, 1940
2,185,977 Vehicle Body Construction and Method of Assembling the Same - Jan. 2, 1940
2,231,846 Underframe Construction - Feb. 11, 1941
2,266,722 Carriage Body of Light Railroad Vehicles - Dec. 16, 1941
Engine bed frame, integrating engine mount and truck bolster:
2,185,988 Engine Bed Underframe - Jan. 2, 1940
The first disk brake, as implemented on the General Pershing Zephyr:
2,228,818 Brake Construction - Jan. 14, 1941
The "shovenose" design. These are particularly interesting to me, because they show that, far from being a styling exercise, the shovelnose design developed by Col. Ragsdale and Albert and Walter Dean included stucture (the engine assembly was supported directly on the power truck bolster), aerodynamics, debris protection for the lightweight and low-slung power truck, engine cooling and accessibility, and other features in an integrated design:
2,256,493 Rail Car Front End Construction - Sept. 23, 1941
2,256,494 Rail Car Front End Construction - Sept. 23, 1941
Car body for a self-contained railcar:
2,197,708 Car Body - Apr. 16, 1940
An intermediate design between the first and second generation shovelnoses, never implemented:
2,185,974 Tractor Unit - Jan. 2, 1940
Another intermediate design, with a separate power unit and double-ended articulated trainset, never implemented:
2,195,599 Vehicle - Apr. 2, 1940 *
A double-ended shovelnose train, similar to the New Haven Comet, never implemented:
2,235,205 Double End Train - Mar. 18, 1941 *
The EA design:
2,185,975 Tractor Unit - Jan. 2, 1940

The following are design patents, protecting the appearance of the trains:

Des. 90,166 Rail Car - June 20, 1933 *

Des. 90,167 Rail Car - June 20, 1933 *

Des. 98,126 Locomotive - Jan. 7, 1936 *

Des. 98,133 Rail Vehicle - Jan. 7, 1936 *

The following patent was assigned to the Pacific Railway Equipment Company (it isn't a Zephyr patent, but I'm including it here since it is vaguely related):

The Pendulum Car suspension design (including its use on an articulated train, as in the early prototype):
2,225,242 Suspension System for Vehicles - Dec. 17, 1940

As I find more patents, I'll add them to this page.

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