The Type 95 ''So-Ki'' was an armored railroad car of the

Imperial Japanese Army The Imperial Japanese Army (IJA; , ''Dai-Nippon Teikoku Rikugun'', "Army of the Greater Japanese Empire") was the principal ground force of the Empire of Japan from 1871 to 1945. It played a central role in Japan’s rapid modernization during th ...

. It was used for patrolling and guarding railway lines in both

Manchuria Manchuria is a historical region in northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day northeast China and parts of the modern-day Russian Far East south of the Uda (Khabarovsk Krai), Uda River and the Tukuringra-Dzhagdy Ranges. The exact ...

and

Burma Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and ha ...

. The chassis was based on the

Type 95 Ha-Go light tank The was a light tank used by the Empire of Japan during the Second Sino-Japanese War, at the Battles of Khalkhin Gol against the Soviet Union, and in the Second World War. It proved sufficient against infantry but was not effective against other ...

. The Type 95 So-Ki had light armor and no fixed weapons armament. Hand-held weapons by the crew would be the only armament available. It had a simple

suspension Suspension or suspended may refer to: Science and engineering * Car suspension * Cell suspension or suspension culture, in biology * Guarded suspension, a software design pattern in concurrent programming suspending a method call and the calling ...

system with

bogie A bogie ( ) (or truck in North American English) comprises two or more Wheelset (rail transport), wheelsets (two Railroad wheel, wheels on an axle), in a frame, attached under a vehicle by a pivot. Bogies take various forms in various modes ...

wheels suspended on

bell crank A bellcrank is a type of crank that changes motion through an angle. The angle can range from 0 to 360 degrees, but 90-degree and 180-degree bellcranks are most common. The name comes from its first use, changing the vertical pull on a rope to ...

s on each side of the chassis. The tracks were driven through the front sprockets. There were three small return wheels. The Type 95 So-Ki was unique as it had both a track and wheel drive system. The vehicle could be changed between railway line wheels mode and track mode for ground use within a few minutes time as it had retractable wheels. In addition, the width of the wheels could be adjusted to the various widths of the

rail gauge In rail transport, track gauge is the distance between the two rails of a railway track. All vehicles on a rail network must have wheelsets that are compatible with the track gauge. Since many different track gauges exist worldwide, gauge dif ...

The Type 95 So-Ki was produced between 1935 and 1943, with 121 to 135 units built.

Notes

References

Taki's Imperial Japanese Army Page - Akira Takizawa
* {{WWIIJapaneseAFVs Armoured cars of Japan Armoured cars of the interwar period World War II armoured fighting vehicles of Japan Military vehicles introduced in the 1930s Military draisines Mitsubishi Road–rail vehicles