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Friday, June 10, 2016 - 11:33 AM UTC
FPW Model has released a new kit, an unusual model of a German Rail Ripper at 1/72
The Schienenwolf was used to destroy the rails by breaking the wooden tiles. Towed by a locomotive, the hook-shaped plough had a stored position for transport, and was lowered to operate.

The kit represents an early variant, and comes with photo etch and metal parts, resulting in a very detailed model given the scale.
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Comments

This one and the searchlight are making me wish they were 1/35th!
JUN 10, 2016 - 12:08 PM
AGV Make one in 1/35th
JUN 10, 2016 - 12:28 PM
No doubt - I love building unusual war materials so I'd definitely buy this in 1/35 to go with my other RR vehicles.
JUN 10, 2016 - 05:42 PM
this nazi war machine is unknown for me.
JUN 11, 2016 - 02:34 AM
Not a Nazi war machine. Devices like this are known to have been in use as far back as the American Civil War, at least. Google is your friend, dude. Get acquainted.
JUN 11, 2016 - 04:50 AM
It is pulled behind a train. The purpose is to break all the railroad ties behind the train and leave a furrow down the track bed. This makes puts the railway out of commission and makes it time consuming to repair the roadbed and replace all the ties before the railway can be restored to service. Normal railway destruct measures are easily reversed because they leave the rails, the ties, and the road bed separated, but each mostly intact.
JUN 11, 2016 - 07:59 AM
Even with a Schwellenpflug, returning the right of way to service is merely labor-intensive, because the rails are still intact. "Sherman's neckties", so named from General Sherman's march to the sea during the Civil War, were much more effective as a long-term destruction; the rails were heated, twisted, and then bent, often around a post or pole; the twisting of the rails would make it impossible to simply remount the rails on new sleepers, requiring that not only ties, but rails, be produced and installed. As Henry Hitchcock, Sherman's military secretary, wrote: "Merely bending rails in ordinary way, by piling ties, laying rails across, and allowing their own weight at ends to bend them, thus, is not effectual. If thus merely bent, they can be restored by reverse process. But if twisted, even a little, they are ruined and must be rerolled." With modern railroads, this is less viable, due to the longer sections rails are produced in today.
JUN 12, 2016 - 10:38 PM
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