History
With electrification of the mayor European axes pending in the late-1950s, SNCF engineers dreamed of a locomotive type which could operate of all 4 major European currents: 1.5 kV DC, 3 kV DC, 15 kV 16⅔ Hz AC and 25 kV 50 Hz AC. Unfortunately, the technology to develop such kinds of locomotives wasn't advanced enough at that time. Therefore the engineers stuck to the idea of realizing a reliable series of dual-voltage locomotive first.
But, with the electrification of the Paris-Brussels line pending, the engineers wanted to modify the locomotives so that they also could operate of the Belgian 3 kV DC. As the locomotive had still primitive DC motors, this could be done by connecting them together in series or series-parallel.
In 1961 the 2 locomotives were delivered as BB 26001 and BB 26002 and closely resembled to their DC counterparts BB 9400, but had also some differences: they had already double lights (one couple for white, one couple for red) instead of a single couple on BB 9400/BB 16000 series and their pantographs were inverted.
Read more about this topic: SNCF Class BB 30000
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“We don’t know when our name came into being or how some distant ancestor acquired it. We don’t understand our name at all, we don’t know its history and yet we bear it with exalted fidelity, we merge with it, we like it, we are ridiculously proud of it as if we had thought it up ourselves in a moment of brilliant inspiration.”
—Milan Kundera (b. 1929)
“The history of his present majesty, is a history of unremitting injuries and usurpations ... all of which have in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world, for the truth of which we pledge a faith yet unsullied by falsehood.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“Systematic philosophical and practical anti-intellectualism such as we are witnessing appears to be something truly novel in the history of human culture.”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)