Goods wagons of welded construction

Goods wagons of welded construction (German: Güterwagen der geschweißter Bauart) were developed and built by the Deutsche Reichsbahn in Germany from 1933 to about 1945.

This enabled goods wagons to be designed, for example, for higher speeds or for higher payloads through the use of different types of steel and other engineering changes, but their further development was so heavily influenced by the exigencies of the Second World War that, as early as 1939, the Deutsche Reichsbahn had to temper the design of goods wagons to the new economic circumstances.

Because there were overlaps in the change from the Austauschbauart - goods wagons made with interchangeable components - to the new welded classes, the period of the changeover cannot be exactly defined.

Goods wagons built during the Second World War that were purely intended for military transport use, are covered under the article on Kriegsbauart - wartime classes.

Consequently, the Deutsche Reichsbahn began to modify existing models or bring out new designs for all goods wagon classes, both from an economic standpoint and with regard to the increasing competition they faced in the transportation market from lorries.