The Speed Merchant was a named train of the Boston and Maine Railroad

Boston and Maine Railroad

The Boston and Maine Corporation , known as the Boston and Maine Railroad until 1964, was the dominant railroad of the northern New England region of the United States for a century...

, between Boston, Massachusetts and Portland, Maine

Portland, Maine

Portland is the largest city in Maine and is the county seat of Cumberland County. The 2010 city population was 66,194, growing 3 percent since the census of 2000...

. The Speed Merchant was purchased by the Patrick B. McGinnis administration of the B&M, and was virtually identical to the John Quincy Adams

John Quincy Adams (train)

The John Quincy Adams was a named train of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, between New York, New York and Boston, Massachusetts. The John Quincy Adams was an attempt by the New Haven to modernize rail travel and lure people out of their cars...

, one of three experimental passenger trains purchased by the New Haven Railroad (under McGinnis) in an attempt to modernize rail travel and lure people out of their cars. The train was built by American Car and Foundry

American Car and Foundry Company

American Car and Foundry is a manufacturer of railroad rolling stock. One of its subsidiaries was once a manufacturer of motor coaches and trolley coaches under the brand names of ACF and ACF-Brill. Today ACF is known as ACF Industries LLC and is based in St. Charles, Missouri...

 to a lightweight Talgo

Talgo

Talgo is a Spanish manufacturer of railway vehicles. It is best known for a design of articulated railway passenger cars in which the wheels are mounted in pairs, but not joined by an axle, and being between rather than underneath the individual coaches...

 design, and was powered by two Fairbanks-Morse

Fairbanks-Morse

Fairbanks Morse and Company was a manufacturing company in the late 19th and early 20th century. Originally a weighing scale manufacturer, it later diversified into pumps, engines, windmills, locomotives and industrial supplies until it was merged in 1958...

 P-12-42

FM P-12-42

The P-12-42, also known as the Speed Merchant, was a streamlined, locomotive built between 1957–1958 by Fairbanks-Morse, specifically to operate on each end of the Talgo train produced by American Car and Foundry...

 Diesel-electric locomotives, (One at each end of the train) connected by Multiple unit

Multiple unit

The term multiple unit or MU is used to describe a self-propelled carriages capable of coupling with other units of the same or similar type and still being controlled from one driving cab. The term is commonly used to denote passenger trainsets consisting of more than one carriage...

 control, through the train.

The train consisted of five sections, each made up of three short cars articulated

Articulated car

Articulated cars are rail vehicles which are consist of a number of smaller, lighter cars which are semi-permanently attached to each other and which share common trucks. They are much longer than single passenger cars, and on the TGV Réseau, for example, 8 cars are joined this way...

together. The center car of each section had two axles (one at each end), with the remaining cars having a single axle each, being supported by adjacent cars at the end opposite the axle. The ride was rough, as with most of the other lightweight trains of the period, and the train was not a success.

The train was in service until 1964..