Märklin 88251 — Class 515 Rechargeable Battery Powered Rail Car with Class 815 Con

The Battery Flash

Electric mobility has been on everyone's lips for some time now. Yet the German Federal Railroad, which was anything but old-fashioned at the time, had already developed an ingenious concept in the 1950s for running electrically on lines without catenary. Starting in 1954 it procured 232 ETA 150 rechargeable battery powered rail cars, which then ran in an environmentally friendly way in the north, south and west for decades. Nicknamed "Akku-Blitze" (battery flashes) or "Heulbojen" (howling buoys), these units usually ran together with matching cab control cars (ESA 150); their very powerful Siemens traction motors even allowed them to haul through cars, mail cars or freight cars, and depending on the type of battery their range was an astonishing 250 - 500 kilometers. Many "Heulbojen" still received the ocean blue/ivory paint scheme introduced in 1975. But then the star of these advanced vehicles began to fade. In 1995 the last train of the class, designated 515/815 since 1968, was finally sidetracked. One example each has been preserved in Bochum-Dahlhausen and Nördlingen.

Prototype

Class 515 rechargeable battery powered rail car and Class 815 cab control car of the German Federal Railroad (DB) in the ocean blue/ivory paint scheme of Era IV. The train looks as it did around 1978.

Model

Metal chassis, plastic bodies. Both trucks on the powered rail car driven by a bell-shaped armature motor. LED headlights changing over with the direction of travel, 3 warm white/2 red. Rear headlights on the powered car can be turned off. Replica cabs with LED interior lighting. Suggested interior details with passenger area lighting. Very high level of detail with a fine, elaborate paint scheme and lettering. Good tractive effort thanks to the high weight of the unit. Length over the buffers approx. 217 mm.