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Just back from two weeks in The Netherlands, where I visited the Utrecht Railway Museum and finally had the chance to get in a cab of a Dutch/American class 1200, offspring of the Pennsylvania Railroad class E-3c.

1) The machine involved was the 1201, the first of the breed in the early 1950’s. The front has been restored more or less to original condition as far as the headlights is concerned. The side-windows in the cab are the modern aluminium sliding types instead of the very American four sliding vertical glass slats and the main reservoir train pipe is a later addition. The independent brake and loco-train brake connection just before the number is original, all Dutch locomotive traction at the time had it. The manufacturing sign is far cleaner than I ever saw it during its lifetime. The locomotive is serviceable, as is the museum’s own 1202 in blue livery. To the left is a 1930’s streamlined EMU of a type that was typical until 1946 when the last of this breed was put in service.

2) Me in the best place of the world, even if it is in a museum. Don’t know where that gut suddenly appeared from, I lived with the happy but clearly erroneous idea it wasn’t that bad. Also, my hand is on the typical Westinghouse train brake (same as the class 47 in the UK Chris) and I forgot to put it in the release and run position, right this moment I would be executing an emergency brake application. Oversight, forgot to turn it back when the accompanying lady suddenly said she’d take pictures of me in the chair. Probably I was taken by surprise. As she was a museum guide she did take the chance to ask a lot of questions about driving an electric locomotive and about bits and pieces in the cab. The Automatic Train Protection box left, with the yellow mushroom button, under it the typical US tower with the traction controls. Above it a lovely old-fashioned speedometer seen sideways. Independent or straight-air brake forward of, and slightly above, my hand on the brake valve lever.

3) The first type of electric traction in The Netherlands, between Rotterdam Hofplein terminus, The Hague and Scheveningen seaside terminus, from 1908. It very much looks like a Prussian express train coach, which betrays its Siemens manufacture. 10 kV 25 Hz AC original traction voltage, more or less what the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New Haven Railroad used on their main lines with catenary out in the open. In 1927 these vehicles were converted to the 1.5 kV DC to which the national network had been standardised, using equipment from Heemaf and Westinghouse that at the same fitted to the 1928 EMU’s of which a coach can be seen behind the glass door, and on the Indonesian Locomotives and EMU’s that were ordered at the time. The livery of this South Holland Electric Railway Company (ZHESM) former AC traction vehicle is the Art Nouveau style with which they were delivered, technically the vehicle is in post-1927 state with the equalizer-bar trucks and DC pantographs. On the motor generator visible behind the front bogie/truck the Heemaf name can be clearly made out when standing close.

June 2017

My entry into this subject really took off when in a charity shop (thrift shop) here in my small Somerset village of Winscombe I ran into Ken Harris’ ‘World Electric Locomotives’, Jane’s Publishing Co. Ltd, London 1981, ISBN 0 531 03728 2. On page 71 an Indonesian (then colonial Dutch East India) PJKA class WH (formerly ESS class 3200) is depicted and described, delivered 1924 for the 1067 mm / 3 ft 6 ins narrow Cape gauge network of the Indonesian island of Java  for the 1920’s 77 mile Jakarta to Bogor electrification at 1.5 kV DC. This, also according further information, was the first Baldwin/Westinghouse licensed type of traction that the Dutch Werkspoor/Heemaf concern built, using Baldwin  and Westinghouse designs and partially US fabricated equipment. Having been shifted to the sidings around the 1980’s one such locomotive still exists in serviceable condition after having been found back somewhere and having been restored to immaculate technical and exterior conditions (Internet pictures can be found, look for ESS class 3200). The traction motors and traction power controls for these locomotives and the EMU railcars came from Pennsylvania, the other equipment was constructed in The Netherlands. I learned from the Internet that at least one US Baldwin/Westinghouse electrical engineer mentioned by name was present when testing of the locomotives in Indonesia started.
It was the first indication that the Dutch post WWII class 1200 electric locomotives had a history that was rather older then what it initially appeared like. For instance, during the early 1920’s 1.5 kV main line electrification in The Netherlands itself started as well, which included conversion of the 1908 vintage 10 kV 25 Hz AC Siemens electrification of the ‘Hofplein’ line from Rotterdam via The Hague to Scheveningen beach. The order for electrical equipment for these EMU railcar trains was shared between Heemaf and Vickers Electric from the UK, of which I didn’t know until recently that they were another Westinghouse electrical equipment licensee. Hence the fact that the electrical components only marginally differed and worked perfectly well together. They both also were involved with the AC to DC conversion of the originally Siemens equipped and beautifully Jugendstil/Art Nouveau liveried EMU railcars for the Hofplein line. Vehicles of both types found a place in the Utrecht railway museum.
During the initial post WWII years The Netherlands were engaged in making good the damage the German army had caused when the tide started to run against them. A rough estimate is that two thirds of the Dutch railway network, its signalling system and its rolling stock were damaged beyond repair or had been looted and taken into the central European areas where the German army considered they could hold out against a further onslaught of the allies and the Russian army. Fortunately they were wrong on that score, but the damage inflicted was enormous and a massive amount of new equipment was required to get the nation’s railways rolling again. In 1950 the Westinghouse/Heemaf combination put in an offer for 75 electric locomotives based on the 1920’s Baldwin/Westinghouse Indonesian box-cab design, 3000 Hp 1,5 kV machines of 1Bo’Bo1′ axle configuration at NLG 700,000.- apiece. These were not appreciated by Netherlands Railways (Nederlandse Spoorwegen, NS) traction engineers because of the dated design that with a Swiss-designed type based on German pre-war electric locomotives just had led to very dis-satisfactory performance, the obsolete technical specification and the fact that the machines were not modern all-adhesion machines but had idling wheels. Werkspoor consulted with Baldwin/Westinghouse, who right that moment were engaged with the E-3 versions for the PRR. As a result a thoroughly revised machine was offered based on the PRR E-3c, albeit a full DC machine and not an AC to DC rectifier machine. Seeing that the power of the 1200 and the E-3c are the same, one could say that the 1200 is the DC part only of the E-3c, to which a resistor traction control system has been added and the transformer, tap-changer equipment and twelve ignitron rectifiers have been taken off. The price was also NLG 100,000.- apiece higher, something not appreciated by the governmental paymasters who, despite the Marshall-help offered, had to furnish the expensive US dollars for later payback. As the well-known French firm of (then) Alsthom, now Alstom, offered technically rather more advanced machines for that money, but to be paid in cheap French francs and accompanied by large French orders for vessels for the internal waterways for the Dutch shipyards, the order for US electric locomotives was cut from 75 to 25; much to the loud chagrin of Heemaf/Werkspoor and probably in their turn for Baldwin/Westinghouse who, as I understand, badly needed orders.The 1200’s, though, were looked at as solid, well-engineered and reliable machines. The main issue with them was that the weight had been cut to 108 metric tonnes (from 378,000 pounds to appr. 250.000 pounds) and that the 500 Hp per traction motor had the habit of causing unnoticed but severe and prolonged wheelslip, especially under wet conditions. Therefore wheelslip-control equipment was added in 1959, something that together with silicon solid-state instead of the ignitron rectifiers in the USA probably would have been a game-changer with much improved traction power and therewith hauling capacity of the PRR E-3 series had they been series-built. Bear in mind that the Swiss were running their Ae6/6 AC six-axle machines at 6,000 Hp for the run through Alpine areas and that German Railways were already putting four-axle electric locomotives of 5,000 Hp in service. With US axle-loads these improvements would more than double hauling power, as was much later demonstrated when the Swedish AEM7’s took over from the GG1’s. Other changes to the class 1200 machines in The Netherlands concerned the headlight configuration, the side-windows in the cabs, which were changed from the very US four-part glass-slat type to aluminium-framed two-part sliding windows that were considerably more silent and wind tight. The side-grilles were replaced by French types that let in less water.The US wasn’t cut out of other rail orders altogether, though. Most of the funds went to manufacturers as General Railway Signal for automatic half barrier equipment on grade crossings, automatic daylight colour-light signalling and NX traffic control equipment in stations and yards. Even the Dutch automatic train protection equipment (installed after the serious Harmelen collision in 1962; it’s in the book) had a US system at its basis. Incidentally, the above-mentioned Jane’s book shows Netherlands Railways electric locomotives, including the class 1200, on pages 87-89. And finally, there were Baldwin switchers of the Bo’Bo’ configuration that were license-built for NS Netherlands Railways in The Netherlands and France as NS class 22/2300, fitted with main line drop-equalizer trucks as per the Spanish electric machines, for faster mainline use.
The history of the Spanish Bo’Bo’Bo’ 3 kV DC machines is rather less clear as there is considerably less serious documentation available, neither in Spanish nor in English, whilst what’s available on the internet is far too much in the locomotive-fan corner and far to devoid of reliable technical and historical matter. The machines, built from 1960 onwards, are technically clearly based on the E-3b’s as far as the DC side is concerned and on the 1200 as far as the design of the locomotive and the DC traction-control side is concerned. Their power again is exactly that of the PRR and the Dutch loco’s. I read that they were used on the curvy and up-and-down (they had resistor brakes, see the large grilles in the roof line) coastal line in Catalonia mainly, hence that I saw one in the Vilanova i le Geltru railway museum not far South of Barcelona on that coastal line. Strangely enough they were considered heavy on the track and mainly pulled light freight trains. The latter perhaps an indication that the wheelslip-control the Dutch put in their class 1200 was not included with the Spanish class 278 and so precluded use more suited to their pedigree? Still, they too lasted a long time, in true Baldwin/Westinghouse fashion.
You might have already noticed that there are quite a few areas where more information is wanted. For instance, who were involved at Baldwin/Westinghouse with the ESS class 3200, the PRR E-3, the NS class 1200 and the RENFE class 278 programmes? What were the specifications and what was the brief? Based on what did they come with the machines they presented; for instance why did they choose the old-fashioned drop equalizer type of trucks instead of the already available low weight-transfer trucks such as the Blomberg? Why were there two types; the Bo’Bo’Bo’ and the Co’Co’? The twelve-wheel trucks are generally seen as heavy on curvy track, which makes the three four-wheel trucks a reasoned choice since no fuel-tanks under the frames were required so the space was there, but the fact that the Spanish thought that they were track munchers makes the technical side rather intriguing. I would like to find out more about that, thinking it wasn’t their wear of the track in curves but wheelslip that they had to contend with. But what did PRR think of it? Also because the Bo’Bo’Bo’ configuration went on the be very successful elsewhere in the world whilst Baldwin/Westinghouse combined four such four-wheeled trucks under the Virginian heavy coal hauling electric locomotives (another issue that requires more study in this context). So the PRR in all likelihood wasn’t disappointed for that reason. Was it PRR’s penury only that stopped the E-2/E-3 development? Keep the old machines going and at the same time gradually drop electrification in favour of the cheap diesel-electric power on offer? Why did the Virginian carry on with their electrification, in that case? But were the GE E-2 and the Baldwin-Westinghouse E-3 types considered technically worth-while, in the light of the fact that the technically quite similar GE-delivered New Haven EP-5 ‘Jet’ electrics knew rather a lot of problems with overheating due to the narrow confines of the carbody versus the heat-generating equipment installed. Their nicknames tell something about the noise their powerful ventilator-fans made when they pulled away from a stop.
Anyway, where the Dutch and Spanish think that a particular development using US electric traction technology started in the 1950’s, US people interested in rail technology at the same time see a development of electric traction coming to an end. Yet the truth is that it lived on, in The Netherlands even now a 1200 can occasionally be seen out and about and both in the Utrecht museum as well as in a rail museum in Augsburg, Germany, examples have been taken into the permanent exhibitions. Of the Spanish machines: I heard at least two are available for inspection in rail museums, among which the one I saw in Vilanova near Barcelona. Even older Baldwin box-cab electric traction can occasionally be seen in action on the isle of Java.

February 2017

The subject of the parentage and the reason for their existence of the Dutch class 1200 Co’Co’ as well as the Spanish class 278 Bo’Bo’Bo’ electric locomotives didn’t, as was to be expected, leave me alone. Having gone through a lot of Internet pages and printed literature on the subject I came as far as this, and that is where as far as I am concerned it gets stuck for the foreseeable future. There is very little on both the Pennsy bit of the story (We’re closing down most electric traction because we’re buying diesel from here on) and the Dutch bit. As far as the Dutch bit in the available literature is concerned; somebody apparently thought that they build nice locomotives in America so let’s try and get some, which patently was nonsense. Technically both European types are not very different from their Pennsy forefathers as far as the DC traction side is concerned, six DC traction motors served in three groups of two as far as feed and overload protection is concerned. The Spanish locomotives, being mountain machines, additionally have dynamic braking, as is clear from the centrally located roof grids to cool the necessary resistances.
The story definitely started in 1924 when the Electric State Railways (ESS, Electrische Staats Spoorwegmaatschappij) in the then East India colonies (nowadays Indonesia) ordered six 1’Bo’Bo’1′ 1.5 kV DC locomotives from Dutch companies Werkspoor/Heemaf. Both of these do no longer exist under those names any longer, Heemaf ended up as part of Holec which, to the best of my present knowledge, is now part of Alstom traction, and Werkspoor closed its railway construction activities sometime in the seventies and went on to build marine heavy diesel engines until being taken on as part of the Finnish Wartsila marine diesel activities. The companies mentioned already had license agreements with Baldwin/Westinghouse and as a result the locomotives for Indonesia were true Baldwin box-cabs with a lot of Dutch-built license kit. One actually still exists, believe it or not. It was found in the way things go in the far-East and it was pain-stakingly restored to exhibition condition. The usual Baldwin longevity shows through in the fact that in 1974 only the last one bowed out from service, to be replaced by Japanese and Dutch built 1.5 kV DC EMU railcars.
Both European types of locomotives, that started out this craving for information, have clear family relations with two types of Pennsylvania Railroad E-3 AC/DC test locomotives: Here it gets interesting. In the early 1950’s Pennsy ordered test locomotives from both General Electric (GE, E-2 Bo’Bo’s) and Baldwin/Westinghouse (E-3b Tri-Bo’ and E-3c Co’Co’). Clearly these machines didn’t do a lot to swing Pennsy’s mood toward further electric traction initiatives and as a result the locomotives remained obscure. Little photographed and even less mentioned and described items in the inventory, to be scrapped in 1964. The GG1’s from the 1930’s lasted a lot longer than that, I saw one in service at Wilmington, Delaware, in 1981.
I have described earlier that the E-3’s were AC to DC machines, They took 11 kV 25 Hz AC from the wires, transformed it down to variable lower voltage AC. On the secondary winding s in the transformer taps were fitted along which a contact moved that took AC of varying voltage of these taps, the so-called tap-changer. A very normal way to run AC electric locomotive traction until the advent of power-electronics with the Thyristor (see ASEA Amtrak AEM-7, based on Swedish Rc). The varying voltages of AC were then fed through rectifiers, at the time still the only available and on board traction not at all convenient mercury-arc “Ignitron” high-power rectifiers. Later solid-state silicon rectifiers just came that bit too late in the US, the step toward diesel had been taken, the GG1’s did everything electric quite satisfactorily and last but not least, Pennsy as well as New York Central were on their way to failure and the Penn-Central/Conrail history already. 
Why the Dutch went for the Baldwin/Westinghouse/Werkspoor/Heemaf route has a lot to do with the mentioned Indonesian boxcabs. Indeed, initially the machines offered in 1950 were, believe it or not, 3,000 hp 1’Bo’Bo’1′ boxcabs. By then, incidentally, Dutch Railways were already talking to the French for a batch of Alsthom (notice the h, Alsace Thomson!) 2,580 hp Bo’Bo’s based on pre-war machines of that type. Indeed, a few of those in fact came to The Netherlands (like LNER 10000 “Tommy” did) to help alleviate the serious Dutch traction shortage caused by the retreating German army a few years before. An additional problem was that the initial 10 Swiss/Dutch 1A’Bo’A1′ class 1000 electrics turned out no good at speed: rather unstable. So there was a certain urgency to get things rolling quick.
As far as I can make out the reason to not order 75 but only 25 3,000 hp class 1200 Co’Co’s is a political one. The French offered a lot of work for Dutch shipyards to build up their inland waterways fleet again (a lot of barges destroyed in the course of setting up that whacky operation Seeloewe, sea lion, to take a German invasion army across the Channel to Britain) and could deliver proven machines quickly as well as rather cheaply off a production line already active for French and Moroccan railways. The resulting class 1100 Bo’Bo’s, dreadful to work on or watch one come wobbling past at speed, they were nonetheless very capable machines power-wise and able to do much that a 1200 Co’Co’ would do. Later a series of 11 Alstom Co’Co’s (class 1300) was added off the production line for the French CC7100 (plus further Moroccan, Spanish and nothing less than Russian electric locomotives). These could be tuned to 4,800 hp but were kept at 3,800 hp in The Netherlands, again very capable machines plus they left the physical constitution of their drivers in better nick and well able to run on their own with the heaviest trains Netherlands Railways would throw at them (the 3,300 tonne ore trains from Amsterdam and Rotterdam to the German Ruhr area, rather good to watch coming past at 100 km/h-60 mph near Oosterbeek where I lived in those days). In the meantime, I understand that the Werkspoor/Heemaf combine had upset governmental powers in The Hague by getting noisily angry about the French orders, whilst they also were fighting cheap French Francs with expensive US dollars from partial Marshall Help arrangements that had to be paid back later. Another problem added to that was that the 1200’s by then cost an extra 10,000 on top of the price quoted for the older type of machine. Furthermore, a lot of that welcome but costly Marshall Help went to big orders for signalling kit from the US and through US licensing as well.
Alstom did well in The Netherlands as far as locomotive traction is concerned. From 1981 onwards they delivered two further series of by then electronically driven (thyristors) electric locomotives, the B’B’ classes 1600 and 1700. Right this moment locomotive traction for passenger trains is a dying occupation and all former NS 1.5 kV DC electric locomotives are now being scrapped bar a few taken over by private interests. As Netherlands Railways is now purely a passenger operator they’ll do everything with EMU railcars and therefore do no longer need electric locomotives and loco-hauled coaches, except on two international jobs, the “emergency” services from Amsterdam to Brussels (awaiting delivery of Alstom EMU railcars after the well-publicised “Fyra” debacle) and the hourly trains from Amsterdam to Berlin (also awaiting new rolling stock which probably is going to be some form of EMU medium high-speed railcar). This last gasp of Dutch locomotive passenger traction is done with a leased fleet of Bombardier Traxx multi-voltage locomotives hauling leftover Dutch and German coaching stock. Soon to vanish indeed.
So the funny situation exists that a very interesting Pennsylvania Railroad initiative to modernise its electric traction after WWII was dumped, in favour of keeping by then already geriatric machines they had at work. But the basics of the 1950’s Pennsy machines turned out moderately successful yet thoroughly appreciated by train buffs in Europe. If US electric traction buffs want to see what Baldwin/Westinghouse “modern” electric traction could have been like, they’ll have to come to Utrecht in The Netherlands for the Co’Co’ version and to VilanovaI Le Geltru in Spain for a peek at the broad gauge Bo’Bo’Bo’ version. If you want to see a narrow gauge (Cape gauge 3 ft 6 ins 1067 mm) version of the boxcabs, incidentally, then go to a railway museum on the island of Java in Indonesia. Perhaps it is arguable that one of the Dutch machines should find a home in the Strasburg PA collection, actually.

Het gekke is dat het plan was om zo’n 75 stuks 1200 aan te schaffen, maar dat het er uiteindelijk maar 25 werden. Er blijken daar een aantal redenen voor te zijn die voor een deel technisch en een ander deel financieel-politiek zijn. Overigens, de NISM type WH 1’Bo’Bo’1’ e-loks uit 1924 voor de electrische dienst op Java waren wel degelijk een reden voor de Nederlandse Spoorwegen om bij Baldwin en Westinghouse te gaan praten. Een andere goede reden was dat op die wijze, door licentiebouw in Nederland, de Marshall fondsen grotendeels in Nederland besteed zouden worden. Het originele type loks uit de USA zouden overigens ook 3,000 pk 1’Bo’Bo’1’ machines zijn geweest voor f 700,000.- per stuk. Technisch gesproken vreemd, omdat de US industrie normaal geen hogere vermogens als 500 pk per tractiemotor inbouwde. Er werd daar, vanwege de gewoonlijk veel hogere aslasten, zonder wielslipbeveiliging gewerkt. Dit zou, ondanks de relatief lage vermogens per as, het leven op de 1200den voor machinisten bij vlagen moeilijk maken tot er in 1959 alsnog wielslipbeveiliging voor bij het aanzetten werd toegepast. Niettemin zag ik gedurende mijn dagelijks reizen tussen Arnhem en Utrecht gedurende de jaren zeventig en tussen Amsterdam en Utrecht gedurende de jaren tachtig in Utrecht bij slecht weer regelmatig een Zandvoort naar Limburg trein met een 1200 met doorslaande voorassen in de draaistellen vertrekken.

De vreemde situatie doet zich voor dat de industrieel en technisch tamelijk meer gestandaardiseerde 1200 machines op een prijs van f 800,000.- per stuk uitkwamen. We spreken bovendien over wat uiteindelijk in US termen maar een halve lokomotief was omdat alleen het gelijkstroom tractiegedeelte met de weerstandsinstallatie werd ingebouwd; de transformator en de gelijkrichters vielen weg. Ik denk dat de reden voor die hogere prijs van politieke aard is. Nog voordat de onderhandelingen met Baldwin en Westinghouse rond waren bestelde NS bij Alsthom de hele serie 1100. De reden hiervoor was dat er een overeenkomst met Frankrijk was dat zij in Nederland binnenschepen lieten bouwen en dat Nederland als tegenprestatie spullen in Frankrijk bestelde. Hiermee was echter wel 2/3rde van de markt voor electrische locomotieftractie verdwenen en werd voor de Baldwin Westinghouse Werkspoor Heemaf combine het hele project veel minder interessant, dus vandaar die hogere prijs. Het wordt openlijk beschreven dat Werkspoor en Heemaf gewoon behoorlijk kwaad waren. De 22/2300den vielen overigens ook onder deze regeling, die werden voor een behoorlijk deel bij Schneider, Jeumont en Creusot in de Elzas besteld.

Een andere reden voor de bestellingen in Frankrijk, echter, is naar alle waarschijnlijkheid dat de tractiemijnheren bij NS al snel door hadden dat de Baldwinmachines er dan wel leuk uitzagen maar dat ze in termen van werkvermogen nogal aan de lage kant zaten. Met 500 pk per as zaten ze ver onder de 645 pk per as van de 1100, die veel van het 1200 werk dan ook zonder te veel moeite kon overnemen, en de 1300 die met een gelijk vermogen per as als de 1100 voor zover het de zware goederendienst betrof tot veel meer in staat was. Daar waren twee redenen voor: a) beide Franse types hadden wielslipbeveiliging en b) hun draaistellen, zeker die van de 1300en, waren van een veel geavanceerdere constructie op het gebied van het tegengaan van weight-transfer effecten. De Franse CC 7100 machines waarvan de 1300 werd afgeleid zaten op een vermogen van zo’n 4700 pk, terwijl in Duitsland de bekende DB electrische standaardlocomotieven voor wat betreft de zwaardere Bo’Bo’ types (E10 en E40) al op 1250 pk per tractiemotor terechtkwamen en daar geen problemen mee gaven. Aan de andere kant; doordat de Baldwinmachines technisch nooit overbelast werden waren ze buitengewoon betrouwbaar. Dat wel.

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January 2017

Being an enthusiast of the slightly manic variety, forever on the prowl for more books and more information, fate worked its wonders once again and about a week ago I found a 1980’s book about electric locomotives of the world for 1 pound Sterling in a charity (thrift) shop. Not in faraway London town, where you may kind of expect this thing to occur, but here in Winscombe of all places. More precisely, in the shop where Lyn works her Friday-afternoons as a volunteer. To some among us this kind of thing happens! It’s happened before (ask me how I obtained John H. White’s marvellous The American Railroad Passenger Car, both volumes, for only 45 Euro!) and hopefully it will happen again.

1) I found further info about the Pennsylvania Railroad Ep-3’s. The picture above shows it clearly: next to Tri-Bo’ axle configurations they came as Co’Co’s as well. Welcome the real father of the Dutch class 1200 Co’Co’s. It simply is the case that heavy-haul machines, especially for winding track, were in the Baldwin/Westinghouse catalogues as Tri-Bo’s (the Spanish machines), whilst machines intended for higher speed came as Co’Co’s (the Dutch machines) because the ride and behaviour on the track of the 3-axle bogies/trucks was much more stable.

If you want proof of that issue then try and have a look at pictures of how French Bo’Bo’s left the track between Lamothe and Morcenx after the 1950’s 180 mph speed trials in comparison to the Co’Co’s. It was then found that A) 1.5 kV DC was not the sort of traction current you should use for that sort of job as an eternal flame on the contact point between pantograph and wires was lighted, it was in fact the moment that thoughts on French railways turned to high-tension 25 kV 50 Hz AC with well-known results. B) That the contemporary 2-axle bogies/trucks left the track in a state ready for thorough reconstruction. It also was in fact the reason why early in the 1900’s the bogies of passenger cars were extended to 3-axle units (see the perfect illustration of a 1900’s US trimount under a British Pullman camping coach vehicle on the beach at Marazion, Cornwall, before rescue and retirement to a museum). In fact, it was only in the 1960’s that we got bad bogie behaviour under control with suitable motion-dampers between the vehicle body and the bogie-frame. The Dutch firm of Koni was involved in those developments before moving out to the USA.

2) What kept me wondering about the Westinghouse/Netherlands Railways link after the war is: how it was established. Obviously there was the post-war “close co-operation” that is described when Dutch signalling engineers went after automatic colour light signalling (and later Automatic train Protection) and ended up with General Railway Signalling kit from Rochester, NY. But that really is quite a few miles away from deciding about obtaining locomotives. Especially since by then the French 1.5 kV products from what then was Alsthom (Alsace Thomson) were proven machines with an excellent track record, even if the Bo’Bo’s were certified bastards to ride at speed (see remarks made above).

Well, the book mentions that the Netherlands East-Indies Railway Company ordered 6 WH type box cab 1’Bo’Bo’1’ electric locomotives for the 3 ft 6 inch Cape gauge from Werkspoor in Amsterdam (who would build and assemble the 1200 series Co’Co’s after the war), with electric kit from Westinghouse and Heemaf in Hengelo NL (who would deliver and assemble the traction kit for the Co’Co’s) as early as 1924. There simply was an established relationship!

I marvel at the fact, incidentally, that US rail buffs, seeking bits of their rail history, have to come to Europe to see it in the flesh. Why is it that items of such contemporary historical value were scrapped so assiduously over there? Incidentally, the book mentions that in the 1980’s in Brazil there still were five of the 1946 built General Electric 2’Do’Do’2’ “Little Joe’s”, re-gauged for the 5 ft 3 ins, in operation. What is left of them? I mean, there is some really fascinating interworking of technical matters and world politics mentioned here. The Joe bit is Josef Stalin: need I say more?

3), Where European and American traction matters parted company is when the Swiss commissioned their celebrated high-power Ae6/6 Co’Co’ electrics. They had found a way to beat weight transfer issues by bringing bolster and secondary suspension down to the underside of the bogie. This bogie was subsequently also used in Sweden, Norway and Belgium and probably I missed a few others out somewhere. See the two green machines, the last ones only very recently were taken out of use as three axle bogies are hard on curving track. It was after all in Switzerland that the word “Schienenfresser” (track munchers) for three-axle bogies was coined. But 6,000 horse power in the early 1950’s; some achievement. One can be seen in that beautiful Verkehrshaus der Schweiz in Luzern. Lovely location too.

December 2016

In the US there really were only four major users of electric traction. That were the Great Northern Railway for the line through the Cascade Mountain at Steven’s Pass, The Pennsylvania Railroad around New York, Washington DC and stretches inland in-between, The New York, New Haven & Hartford between New York and Hartford CT and the Virginian Railroad in West Virginia, a big coal-haulier. Most electric traction indeed came from the Westinghouse stables, with Baldwin from Philadelphia PA as the main supplier of the non-electric technical bits. General Electric similarly was a supplier of electrical traction systems, notably to the New Haven.

If the loco’s ran on AC-wired systems, rectifying the line voltage to DC and then feeding that as normal through resistances (resistors) to the series wound DC traction motors was the done thing all along. The problem mainly was that when such a series wound DC motor lost adhesion on the track and it was not noticed the motor would go into an uncontrolled spin and eventually self-destruct. For that reason no more than about 500 hp per motor was allowed, also because the effects of weight-transfer in the bogies, unloading the front axle when accelerating, was far from being resolved. Most US traction discussed here used the mercury-arc “ignitron” rectifiers, a somewhat iffy method using enclosed mercury jets to rectify the AC to DC. On the bouncing, rolling and shaking rail vehicles a somewhat contentious way to deal with this process and problems, among others an extra source of heat next to the in those days massive transformers to get the 11 to 20 kV AC down to 1 kV DC suitable for traction. This notably was the downfall of the New Haven EP-5 “Jets”, who experienced several fires due to the closely packed kit on board and who derived their nickname from the fact that they sounded like the 50’s and 60’s jets when pulling away. In our days the Eurostar power cars perhaps may have warranted a similar nickname, especially when using their rheostatic dynamic brakes without being able to get rid of the generated juice into the supply grid as on the English Southern. Working at Stewart’s Lane depot in London you certainly knew when a Eurostar set passed by even when you couldn’t see it.

In any case, the situation improved mightily when AC rectification moved on to using silicon solid-state rectifiers. Unfortunately the US by then had decided to go for the in its initial costs far cheaper diesel option. The railways in Europe, in the sixties starting to look for high-speed application of electric traction with the accompanying need for high-tension traction power from the wires above, explored the AC and DC options further, ditched resistance DC and tap-changer AC traction control altogether and moved on to GTO chopper control initially and then to IGBT AC and –chopper DC control. At the moment a serious traction installation is fed with 50 or 60 Hz AC, that is transformed to 3 kV AC, rectified to 3 kV DC and then inverted to variable frequency AC to feed the brushless induction traction motors. The clever bit is the variable frequency here; those traction motors follow the frequency that is being fed to them. Vary the frequency, vary the speed. It isn’t quite as simple as said here but the principle holds. Because already in the initial power phase an inherent wheelslip control is being exerted on the motor, added to which very precise further wheelslip control has been added, 2000 hp per motor is the norm. Hence those 80 tonne European electric loco’s in pairs that happily drag 5,400 tonne freights in-between the mad timetabled passenger trains in the large conurbations. Or run at 200 km/h (125 mph) with a passenger train on their next run.

To see where the USA got to in their last stage of serious electric rail operations, which was the period from which the Dutch 1200s and the Spanish 278s derive, a few pictures of what was to be seen in those days. 1 is the famous Art Deco 2’Co’Co’2’ Pennsy GG1, the Raymond Loewy (among much else the Coke bottle) styled iconic US electric. Number 2 is the much more modern Co’Co’ New Haven EP-5 “Jet”. Its influence on the styling of the Dutch machines is noticeable.

December 2016

Recently I got fired up to chase the family tree of the Netherlands Railways class 1200 Co’Co’ locomotives. Machines that I erroneously thought were a sort of one-off, the USA assisting the Dutch in the period just after WWII under the Marshall agreements. The Dutch with their 3/4ths destroyed railways that they so badly needed to get the country moving again. The time of the British loaning an LNER Manchester-Wath 1.5 kV dc Bo’Bo’ locomotive “Tommy” and the French loaning a number of their pre-war dc-electrics, before permanent replacements for lost electric traction started to be commissioned. Those Baldwin designed and part US-fabricated 1200 class locomotives held out till 1998 with NS Netherlands Railways and occasionally a few are still about. They were very reliable, liked by the crews and good machines to look at, a thrill when they come past at speed whilst you’re waiting in a car at the closed barriers of a level crossing, or stand on a platform in a station. The latter especially at the seaside resort of Zandvoort aan Zee, as the view of the big US machines in that terminal station in the dunes was mingled with the pleasure of watching Amsterdam cooling itself in the North Sea, dressed from very scantily to not at all. One 1200, incidentally, is on display in the Utrecht railway museum.

I discovered that I was wrong on two counts, however. In Spain there were locomotives from the same stables, purchased under the same Marshall-plan facilities to get their railways functioning again and put together in very much the same fashion. So the 1200s were not the only US electric locomotives exported to Europe and they were not unique loners but part of a family. Whilst in Barcelona I learned about the big museum in Vilanova I le Geltrú and its residents. Lo and behold, there was one of the class 278 Bo’Bo’Bo’ machines, locally named “Panchagro’s”. I thought then that the Dutch machine was the standard and that the Spanish machine was a clever adaptation to heavy mountain hauling. I was wrong on that score too, the Tri-Bo’s were the standard. However, nothing remains of the endeavour in real life in the Eastern USA, all were scrapped with the demise of Baldwin, of Pennsylvania Railroad and its being merged with the New York Central Railroad into Penn-Central. You received pictures of both types.

Recently I discovered on a few websites about the Pennsy E-3C’s, single cab electric ac machines of the Tri-Bo’ arrangement. Baldwin and Westinghouse at the time were trying to chip out a corner in the market for electric traction and a six-axle ac electric with ignitron rectifiers for the East Coast ac networks of the New Haven and the Pennsylvania Railroads was what these machines were meant for. Two of the machines back to back among the four of them or working with 4-axle variants was the idea, it did not get picked up big time. Fuel was cheap, diesels a fiercely contested market where the purchase prices were low (hence the glut of GM-EMD technology and even complete diesels making their mark in Europe at the time, the ALCO-PA Co’Co’s in Spain are part of that drive). Furthermore, the Pennsy was too happy with their legendary GG1 2’Co’Co’2’ machines that seemed happy on any job. It didn’t work out for Baldwin-Lima-Hamilton and the manufacturer folded quite soon after the delivery of the straight dc loco’s to Europe. Other US machines with a sideways connection to this story are the not altogether successful New Haven EP-5 “Jets”, Co’Co’ machines the design of which provided the template for the 1200’s in the Netherlands

Above a picture of Pennsy 4995. A piece of most interesting history long scrapped, to see US electrics of the period you’ll have to come to Europe. To see the GG1’s there are various locations in the US where you can see them. Incidentally, have a look at details such as that ladder to the roof just behind the entrance door. The protection lid coming from off the roof to prevent anyone coming under the juice and being exposed to live bus-bars on the roof. No doubt a key of the sort used to connect the train to hotel power and get the pantographs up here was necessary to remove that lid. Take that key out of the dashboard and the pan comes down. Also have a look at the registration of the wire above the track. High speed of any kind well out of the question there.