IRT PRE-WAR CARS

Here is a list of the subway cars built by and for the old IRT subway. IRT stood for the Interborough Rapid Transit Company which operated all of the lines now called the IRT or 'A' Division of the NYCTA.

There were two main types of cars ordered through the years by the IRT: High Voltage, in which 600 volt third rail power was connect between all of the cars in the train and Low Voltage, in which a 32 volt battery and connections provided power to control 600 volt circuits in each car.

Link to all of the IRT pre-WWII fleet from the New York Subways Resources Web pages.

CAR NUMBERS	COUNT	VOLTAGE	TYPE	MFGR	YEAR	PHOTO
2000-2059	60	H	Composite	Jewt	1903
2060-2119	60	H	Composite	StL	1903
2120-2159	40	H	Composite	Wasn	1903
3000-3039	40	H	Composite	Jewt	1904
3040-3139	100	H	Composite	Stpn	1904
3140-3279	140	H	Composite	StL	1904
3280-3339	60	H	Composite	Wasn	1904
Total Composite	500	After 1918, wooden cars were banned from subway service and the wood-steel composites were then assigned to the elevated lines.
3340	1	H	A.Belmont	Wasn	1902	at BERA
3341	1	H	JB.McDonald	Wasn	1902
3342	1	H	First Stl	PRR	1903
3344	1	H	Mineola	Wasn	1904
Special cars	5	Inclding 5302 below Lo-V non revenue car
3350-3516	167	H	Gibbs	AC&F	1904
3517-3649	133	H	Gibbs MUDC	AC&F	1905
3650-3699	50	H	Deck Roof	AC&F	1907
3700-3756	57	H		AC&F	1910
3757-3809	53	H	MUDC	AC&F	1910
3810-3814	5	H	MUDC	StSt	1910
3815	1	H		StSt	1910
3816-3849	34	H	MUDC	StSt	1910
3850-3914	65	H	MUDC	PrSt	1910
3915	1	H		PrSt	1910
3916-4024	109	H	MUDC	PrSt	1910
Total Steel HV including trailers below	967
4025-4036	12	L	Steinway	PCo	1915
4037-4160	124	L	Flivver*	PCo	1915
4161-4214	54	L	Trailer	PCo	1915
4215-4222	8	L	Steinway	PCo	1915
4223-4514	292	H	Trailer*	PCo	1915
4515-4554	40	L	Trailer	PCo	1916
4555-4576	22	L	Steinway	PCo	1916
4577-4699	123	L		PCo	1916
4700-4770	71	L	Steinway	PCo	1916
4771-4810	40	L		PCo	1916
4811-4825	15	L	Trailer	PCo	1916
4826-4965	140	L	Trailer	PCo	1917
4966-5301	336	L		PCo	1917
5302	1	L	Pay & Revenue Collection	PCo
5303-5377	75	L	Trailer	PCo	1922
5378-5402	25	L	Trailer	PCo	1922
5403-5502	100	L		AC&F	1924
5503-5627	125	L		AC&F	1925
5628-5652	25	L	Steinway	AC&F	1925
5653-5702	50	L	World's Fr	StL	1938
Total Steinway	188
Total other LV	1197
Total IRT cars	2857

Manufacturers key and subtotals:

CODE	FULL	COMP	Hi Volt		Lo Volt		STEINWAY		SPEC	TOTAL
CODE	FULL	COMP	MOT	TRL	MOT	TRL	LO-V	WF	SPEC	TOTAL
AC&F	American Car and Foundry		460		225		25			710
Jwet	Jewett Car Company	100								100
PRR	Pennsylvania Railroad								1	1
PrSt	Pressed Steel Car Company		175				12			187
Pco	Pullman Company			292	623	349	101		1	1366
StL	St. Louis Car Company	200						50		250
StSt	Standard Steel Car Company		40							40
Stpn	Stephenson Car Company	100								100
Wasn	Wason Car Company	100							3	103
Totals		500	675	292	848	349	138	50	5	2857

Type Key:

Composite - combination of wood sides on steel frame.
Gibbs - All steel car named for the IRT Chief Engineer, George Gibbs, who designed them with the Pennsylvania RR Altoona Shop help.
MUDC - Multiple Unit Door Control - Hi Voltage cars not so marked had manually operated doors. MUDC cars had automated doors. Some of the non-MUDC cars could operate as the first or last car, the conductor or rear guard used the MUDC to open the middle cars and levers to operate the first/last car.
There were some individual cars listed in the non-MUDC that were retrofitted and others in the MUDC series that were not converted.
See the New York Subways Resources IRT page for details.
Steinway - Cars designed with special gearing for the steep grades in the Steinway Tunnel (#7 Flushing Line)
Flivver - Name given to new LV cars built at the time that the Flivver automobiles were introduced. They also had a different power control system and could not operate with any other type of IRT car.
Cars without any type are regular motor cars of the voltage H or L.
Trailer - these cars had no motors, control, or air equipment on board. They were usually operated in trains of 7 motors and 3 trailers or 5 motors and 1 trailer.
Trailer* - 4223-4250 in their last years were motorized as blind motors (no controls); the motors coming from various non-MUDC cars which were being scrapped.
Worlds Fr - cars purchased for the 1939 World's Fair for IRT.

See information about Door controls and Cabs on this page.

IRT Elevated Lines

In addition to the above subway cars, the IRT had a number of elevated cars for use on the Manhattan and Bronx 'el' lines between the 1880's and 1956. All of the el cars started as Steam pulled Trains on the els. Some were converted to electric operation retaining their end gates and others had the ends enclosed and automatic doors installed.

- The JoeKorNer

All photos are from the MTA New York City Transit archives. These GIF files were scanned from offset press prints, thus the quality of the reproduction varies with your monitor and video card capabilities.