Railways in Silesia/Poland

[Allegheny1600]

Hi All,

 I went to Poland in 1990, it was a cycling trip really but I did get to see some of the railways there. I think this link should take you to a small album of mainly Polish pictures, with I think just one Czech picture.

Please excuse the blurry snapshot on the way out of Krakow but it was very hurried! When I’d passed under that bridge and could look back at the loco, the driver was shaking his fist at me!

Edit: a question about Polish electrification is better served with a photo of an electric loco!

 

Anyway - I subsequently took an interest in the mountain railways of Silesia in Prussian times. Back then, they developed an early full mainline electrification scheme, I understand it was started before WW1 but only completed after the war. This was at what became the German standard of 15Kv at 16 2/3 cycles (one third of industrial frequency). 
I believe that after WW2 when the area was under Soviet control, the entire electrification system, masts, wires, locomotives - everything, was claimed as war reparations and taken to the USSR (for research? I know that later, some locomotives were returned to what was by then, East Germany).

My question, if anyone can help, is then - why did the PKP pursue its electrification with the 3000v DC system?

 I presume it’s because that was the system the Soviets knew and understood, I also presume that by then, there were no remaining engineers who understood the 15Kv system?

It would be nice to have these suspicions confirmed, please.

 Thanks,

 John 

Edited May 8, 2022 by Allegheny1600
Add photo

[eastwestdivide]

Found a transcript of a 1933 article at https://www.nature.com/articles/132599b0

saying tantalisingly 

Quote

The commission appointed by the Government recommended the use of direct current at 3,000 volts

but not giving a reason for the choice

[Allegheny1600]

Aha!

Thanks for that, I was looking at the Silesian line in isolation. Clearly, having to start again, one would use the system one is used to in other parts of the country!

Cheers,

 John 

[Bill Jamieson]

The Bufe book 'Eisenbahnen in Schlesien' (presumably still obtainable s/h from Germany), goes into some detail about the dismantling of electrification equipment by the Soviets from 1945 and it's clear that it was quite ruthless, including Mittelsteine power station, various substations and the repair shops at Schweidnitz, not to mention all the locos, which were first moved west to the. mitteldeutschen Netz (in the Soviet zone of Germany) before being taken to the USSR. There would have been nothing significant left to re-use quite apart from the fact the PKP seems to have already decided pre-war to adopt 3KV DC as standard.

Bill

[EddieB]

While part of eastern Upper Silesia was ceded to Poland in 1921 (following the three uprisings commemorated in Katowice), Lower Silesia remained part of Germany until the redrawing of boundaries after WW2. 

 

The KPEV electrification initially connected Lauban (now Luban) and Königszelt (now Jaworzyna Slaska), later extending westwards to Görlitz and north-east to Breslau (Wroclaw) - so never reached into Polish territory.

 

Perhaps it is therefore not surprising that for the PKP electrification schemes that began in the 1930s, Poland turned to a consortium of British companies (including English Electric and Metropolitan Vickers) and a technology widely adopted during that period.

Edited May 8, 2022 by EddieB
tautology!

[burgundy]

There is quite a good article on wiki which should be legible through the translation facility. 

Best wishes 

Eric 

[jsp3970]

The Warsaw area was the first to be electrified by the PKP at 3,000 DC. They acquired EMU's for the suburban service as well as six locomotives to haul long distance trains. The UK played a big part in supplying equipment / complete locomotives for this project. Later they built four more locomotives using EMU equipment.

[SM42]

On 22/05/2022 at 13:03, jsp3970 said:

The Warsaw area was the first to be electrified by the PKP at 3,000 DC. They acquired EMU's for the suburban service as well as six locomotives to haul long distance trains. The UK played a big part in supplying equipment / complete locomotives for this project. Later they built four more locomotives using EMU equipment.

 

English Electric supplied 20 locos ( class EU06) in the 1960s

 

Their Polish cousins, classes EU07, EP08 and  the ET41 double  locos ( built in Wroclaw and Poznan) are still in regular use. 

 

Some of the EU06s are preserved. 

The museum at Chabowka has one I believe. 

 

For obvious reasons they have the nickname Anglik ( englishman)

 

Andy

Edited May 25, 2022 by SM42

[EddieB]

There's quite a gap between the British locomotives/emus supplied in the 1930s for the earliest 3000V electrification and the EU06 in 1962. 

 

The original two British locomotives were the EL100 class (1934), extended by four built under licence by Chrzanów  (1935).  They were numbered EL101-106 (later E101-106 and EP01 class) and became extinct by 1964.  They were joined in 1937 by nos. EL201-204, from Cegielski (which survived until 1958).

 

The latter should not be confused with the first post-war construction E110-117 from Pafawag (1952), which became the EP02 class.  Around the same time ASEA delivered E150-157 (later EP03), followed by the E04 series (later EU04, from LEW, Hennigsdorf in 1955) and the EU05/EP05 from Skoda (1961).  All these were Bo-Bo electrics, and examples survive in preservation.

 

I think it was the EU04 that brings us back to Silesia, being intended for operation between Warszawa and Gliwice, being allocated to Czechowice, Lazy, Wroclaw and Gliwice through their careers.

Edited May 26, 2022 by EddieB
Correction EP02 were originally E110 series (not EL110)

[Johann Marsbar]

15 hours ago, SM42 said:

 

English Electric supplied 20 locos ( class EU06) in the 1960s

 

Their Polish cousins, classes EU07, EP08 and  the ET41 double  locos ( built in Wroclaw and Poznan) are still in regular use. 

 

Some of the EU06s are preserved. 

The museum at Chabowka has one I believe. 

 

For obvious reasons they have the nickname Anglik ( englishman)

 

Andy

 

Chabowka certainly had EU07-001 in the collection when I went there in 2006.....

 

 

...though an EU06 may have gone there after I visited,  given that it's 16 years ago now!

A large number of the EU06's were stored at Krakow depot at that time......

 

[jsp3970]

6 hours ago, EddieB said:

There's quite a gap between the British locomotives/emus supplied in the 1930s for the earliest 3000V electrification and the EU06 in 1962. 

 

The original two British locomotives were the EL100 class (1934), extended by four built under licence by Chrzanów  (1935).  They were numbered EL101-106 (later E101-106 and EP01 class) and became extinct by 1964.

When I was doing my initial research almost thirty years ago one of my contacts at GEC informed me that four bodies for new locomotives were shipped to Poland and arrived there in late August 1939, but then disappeared. I seem to remember that they were listed as class E110. However aside from that information I have never heard anything else.

 

There was another electric railway that the PKP operated in Silesia, the Walim - Jugowice line which was energized at 1kV DC. This was operated by a single Bo centre cab locomotive numbered E401 that is preserved in Warsaw.

[EddieB]

25 minutes ago, jsp3970 said:

When I was doing my initial research almost thirty years ago one of my contacts at GEC informed me that four bodies for new locomotives were shipped to Poland and arrived there in late August 1939, but then disappeared. I seem to remember that they were listed as class E110. However aside from that information I have never heard anything else.

 

There was another electric railway that the PKP operated in Silesia, the Walim - Jugowice line which was energized at 1kV DC. This was operated by a single Bo centre cab locomotive numbered E401 that is preserved in Warsaw.

I'd be interested to know more about both these leads.

 

Metropolitan Vickers supplied parts for the four pre-war Cegielski locos, and it was the post-war Pafawag locos that were first numbered in the E110 series (I've corrected a typo in my earlier post) - so it's unclear what became of the bodies supplied in 1939 (possibly seized or destroyed?) 

 

The other Silesian connection, which also included parts from MV, was the batch of nine 3000V locos built by Pafawag for the PMP industrial system from 1956.  At least one of the loco bodies survives (or did until recently) as a store at Sosnowiec.  http://www.locomotives.com.pl/Electric Locomotives/2E53.htm

 

I hadn't appreciated E401, which I see is plinthed at Grochow depot, Warszawa.  At least I've managed to find it on Google Streetview: 

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Ekspozycja+lokomotywy+EU40/@52.2552338,21.101154,2612m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x471ecdb2bc5ead19:0xfeaac6e3d448bbaf!8m2!3d52.2552338!4d21.1063594