History and Background of Gas Turbine Locomotives
In the 1950s the Swiss Federal gas turbine locomotive, the Am 4/6 1101 was tested by the German railways: Its higher fuel consumption compared to the DB Class V 200.0 made it uneconomical for the Deutsche Bundesbahn to consider introducing similar locomotives and afterwards reciprocating diesel engines were the primary source of non-electric traction on German raillines.
In the 1960s, the first locomotives of the V160 series went into service; these were originally designed for medium-duty service. For more demanding applications such as express passenger work and freight trains on non-electrified routes (such as the winding route from Munich to Lindau) the Deutsche Bundesbahn considered an enhanced performance version of these locomotives; for this reason, the concept of a locomotive of V160 series with a gas turbine as a booster was investigated. The gas turbine had the advantage of low weight and size - particularly important if it was to be included in the standard body of a V160 class locomotive.
Because the turbine would only be activated when additional power was required (such as accelerating from speeds above 25 km/h and on inclines) the effect of the high fuel consumption of the turbine would be minimised. The output from the turbine was to be input on an additional stage on the hydraulic transmission. This concept was successfully tested in the DB V 169 001 locomotive built in 1965 (as of 1968, the reporting name was 219 001).
However, the Deutsche Bahn decided that the successor to this locomotive should have a more powerful gas turbine and the AVCO Lycoming T 53-L13 was selected which had already been selected for use in the Bundeswehr Helicopter Bell UH-1 D. The Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz factory (see Deutz AG Motorenfabrik Oberursel (now part of Rolls-Royce Germany) made the engines for the German Army under license, and was able to maintain and repair the turbines.
Thus from 1970 onwards the Class 210 was born.
Read more about this topic: DB Class 210
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