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  • GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

  • Discussion of General Electric locomotive technology. Current official information can be found here: www.getransportation.com.
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GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

Discussion of General Electric locomotive technology. Current official information can be found here: www.getransportation.com.

Moderators: MEC407, AMTK84

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GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #749720  by MEC407
 
GE’s model C30ACi, the first AC diesel electric locomotive to be introduced to sub-Saharan Africa, will have an engine that delivers 3,300 Gross HorsePower (GHP) using an electronic fuel-injection system that automatically supplies the exact amount of fuel needed for optimal engine efficiency. The locomotives will also feature GE’s unique AC propulsion technology and dynamic braking. The addition of these new locomotives, which will be used to haul freight and coal, will decrease life-cycle costs, improve fuel efficiency and reduce emissions. The first locomotives and kits are scheduled to be delivered in early 2011; locomotive assembly in country, with kits from Erie and engines from Grove City, should begin at the end of 2010.
Read the entire press release at: http://www.newswiretoday.com/news/62365/

Personal commentary: based on the horsepower rating, I would guess that these locomotives have either a 12-cylinder FDL or an 8-cylinder GEVO under the hood. Hopefully an article with more details will be forthcoming.

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #749866  by MEC407
 
Another article with slightly more information (but still no word on what lurks under the hood):

http://www.goerie.com/apps/pbcs.dll/art ... /312189888

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #750306  by Allen Hazen
 
'C30' (which finally replaced 'U30C' some time in the ?? 1990s ??) has been GE's trademark for its highest-rated FDL-12 powered export locomotives. All locomotives so far identified as having GEVO engines have had 'ES' model designations.
Since GE's model designations are utterly and invariably systematic, this is conclusive proof that these units (like many recent export locomotives) will have FDL engines.
--
(Is the irony in the last sentence heavy-handed enough that everyone recognized it?)

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #750308  by MEC407
 
I'm sort of wondering why GE isn't calling it AC30i, which would seemingly follow their naming convention for FDL-powered AC traction locos... but I guess it doesn't matter in the long run, since railroaders, railfans, and everyone in between will come up with at least three of four alternative names for it anyway. :wink: (Example: AC4400, AC4400CW, AC44, C44AC -- all refer to the same locomotive, and all are "correct" and/or "official" depending on who you ask!)

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #891772  by MEC407
 
Transnet will soon take delivery of the first 10 C30ACi locomotives:
SouthAfrica.info wrote:"Transnet are desperately short of locomotives and the delivery of the locos is most welcome," Allen Jorgensen, a rail expert and research officer at the Railroad Association of SA, told Business Day this week. "These state-of-the-art locomotives will allow Transnet to de-electrify their lines where there has been insufficient supply of electricity in the past."
Read more at: http://www.southafrica.info/business/ec ... 190111.htm

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #891997  by Allen Hazen
 
So, how many places around the world are building GE locomotives these days?
--- I believe GE made arrangements to build locomotives in Indonesia at one time, don't know the current status
---Kazakhstan
---China for BIG (GEVO-16 engined) locomotives: factory there is a joint venture of GE and a Chinese company
---Turkey, if anybody other than Freightliner orders any Powerhaul (I don't think the Tulomsas/GE consortium has actually built anything yet)
---Back in the 1980s the Mexican railways were building C30-7 and/or B23-7 from kits, but I don't think that arrangement has continued
---Goninan (or whatever the company is called nowadays: I think the word "united" occurs in the name) in Australia
---and now South Africa
---(Not, of course, to forget Brazil and Erie, PA!)

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #902483  by GEVO
 
Railways Africa wrote:TRANSNET MARKS A MAJOR MILESTONE IN ITS LOCOMOTIVE FLEET RENEWAL PROGRAMME

In a ceremony held at the company’s Koedoespoort manufacturing facility in Pretoria today, Transnet Limited took delivery of the first two of the 100 locomotives it is purchasing from General Electric South Africa Technologies (GESAT) – the local arm of General Electric (GE).

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #902876  by Allen Hazen
 
GEVO--
Thank you for that link! Nice photo of the locomotive (though the short hood is ... not a masterpiece of aesthetics).

The trucks look as if they are a fabricated-frame variant of the "roller blades" truck... slightly ironic, since I think the actual truck-frame casings for many current GE domestic locomotives are from a foundry in South Africa. (Fabricated frame versions have been used on many recent GE locomotives built for railroads with lighter weight limits than U.S. lines: the NR class in Australia and the high-altitude cowl units for Tibet being examples.)

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #1006118  by MEC407
 
GE has received an order for 43 more locomotives from Transnet.
bizcommunity.com wrote:Public Enterprises Minister, Malusi Gigaba, has approved Transnet's purchase of an additional 43 C30ACi diesel-electric locomotives from GE's local arm, General Electric South Africa Technologies (GESAT).
...
The agreement takes the total number of locomotives Transnet has bought from the manufacturer to 143. The locomotives are to be deployed on Transnet Freight Rail's various lines throughout the country especially, the general freight business.

The C30ACi is the first AC diesel electric locomotive to be introduced in sub-Saharan Africa. These locomotives, which will be used to haul freight and coal, will decrease life-cycle costs, improve fuel efficiency and reduce emissions.
Read more at: http://www.bizcommunity.com/Article/196/464/69128.html

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #1057259  by MEC407
 
From BusinessDay:
BusinessDay wrote:STATE-owned rail-building company, Transnet Rail Engineering (TRE), was building General Electric (GE) locomotives at levels of quality that exceeded the expectations of TRE’s GE partners. the CEO of GE Transportation for China, southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, Tim Schweikert, said last week.

That boded well for the revival of SA’s engineering industry and the country’s ambitions to become a supplier of locomotives for export markets, he said.
...
The Class 43 GE locomotives that are being produced in SA are offering the owners of the assets an average availability of 94%, Mr Schweikert said.

Locomotive availability is a key measure of performance used by rail operators to measure the effectiveness of their operations and a big contributor to profitability.
Read more at: http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/C ... ?id=174859

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #1198969  by MEC407
 
53 more GE locomotive kits for South Africa, and possibly hundreds more in the future:
GoErie.com wrote:GE Transportation has booked an order for 53 locomotive kits valued at $108 million, and the potential exists for a vastly larger order later this year.

The order, from South African Transnet SOC Limited, will be filled with engines built in Grove City and other systems built and assembled in Erie, according to a statement from the Export-Import Bank of the United States. The Ex-Im Bank provides below-market financing to facilitate sales of American goods to foreign countries.

The recent order for kits will be shipped later this year to Transnet facilities in Pretoria, South Africa, to be assembled by local workers in that region.

This order follows one placed by Transnet in 2011 for 47 locomotives. Together, the two orders represent $230 million worth of business for GE Transportation.
. . .
Lorenzo Simonelli, chief executive of GE Transportation, hinted that more business could be coming to the company and its workers in Erie. The company is pursuing an order for 465 complete locomotives that would be delivered to Transnet.
Read more at: http://www.goerie.com/ge-transportation ... bigger-one" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #1257847  by MEC407
 
Transnet is buying 233 ES40ACi locomotives from GE:
GE wrote:Transnet said today that it would buy 233 advanced Evolution Series locomotives developed by GE Transportation. This new purchase comes on top of 143 locomotives that Transnet ordered from GE since 2010.

Core parts of the locomotives including the engines will be made in the U.S. The machines will be assembled at a customer facility in South Africa.
Read the rest of the press release at: http://www.gereports.com/post/798283153 ... th-africas" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Re: GE to build 100 locomotives for South Africa

 #1258482  by renrut44
 
MEC407 wrote:Transnet is buying 233 ES40ACi locomotives from GE:
The order was split with China Northern Railway Corporation (232 units)

http://www.chinacnr.com/Portals/0/Batch ... 968750.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

3300 kW (4400 HP to those still living in the dark ages), prime mover not confirmed but rumoured to be Cummins QSK95

China has a long and unhappy history of supplying lemons into Africa, All the African political elite is interested in is the size of the kickback

Re: 100 locomotives for Angola

 #1336319  by MEC407
 
Photo by Jim Johnston:

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=535157" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Re: 100 locomotives for Angola

 #1336327  by Allen Hazen
 
Thanks for linking that interesting photo of an export unit in primer paint.
--Frustratingly, between the shadows, the bridge railings, and what I take to be truck-mounted sandboxes at each end of the truck frame, it's hard to get a good view of the truck details. My current GUESS is that it's 4-axle: probably similar to the trucks on a number of narrow gauge GE units for Brazil, and ultimately to those on the earlier U.P. GTEL.
--Number series in 4400s. OBVIOUSLY it isn't safe to infer much about a locomotive from its number, but … this at least SUGGESTS it might be a 4400 hp unit.
--Looks like eight tall engine-compartment doors on each side. This would be GE practice for locomotives powered by FDL-16 engines. (U.S. air quality regulations prevent the use of this engine on new units for North American service, but GE has continued to use FDL engines on locomotives going elsewhere.)
--HUGE radiator compartment:looks longer than the radiator compartment on domestic units. (This is similar to some GE designed locomotives built for service in Australia. I think rearranging the radiator to fit in a more restrictive loading gauge necessities spreading it out lengthwise.)
--Nice the it is coupled to a unit built to North American standards: this gives some idea of how much lower the export unit is!
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