South African Class 9E, Series 1

The South African Railways Class 9E, Series 1 of 1978 is an electric locomotive.

In 1978 and 1979, the South African Railways placed twenty-five 50 kV AC Class 9E, Series 1 electric locomotives with a Co-Co wheel arrangement in service on the Sishen-Saldanha iron ore export line.^[1]

Manufacturer

The 50 kV AC Class 9E, Series 1 electric locomotive was designed for the South African Railways (SAR) by the General Electric Company (GEC) and was built by Union Carriage and Wagon (UCW) in Nigel, Transvaal. UCW delivered twenty-five locomotives in 1978 and 1979, numbered in the range from E9001 to E9025.^[2]

Features

The locomotive has a single full width air conditioned cab. At the rear end, the bodywork is lower to provide clearance for the 50 kV AC electrical equipment, which is mounted on the roof. This consists of a single pantograph, a potential divider, a vacuum circuit breaker, a surge diverter and the main transformer’s high voltage terminal. The electrical control system is solid state, using thyristors.^[3]

Since huge voltage drops are often encountered between electric sub-stations, the locomotive was designed to be able to operate on a supply varying between 55 and 25 kV AC. The battery boxes and the main air reservoirs are mounted between the bogies beneath the frame, where a compartment houses a small motor scooter, for use by the crew for lineside inspections of the train, which can be up to 4 kilometres (2.5 miles) long.^[3]

Wabco brake air dryer on E9024

Series 1 locomotives have four braking systems, air brakes for the locomotive, train air braking, a handbrake and dynamic rheostatic braking which can dissipate 4,200 kilowatts (5,600 horsepower).^[3]

By 2007, the entire fleet of both series of Class 9E electric locomotives were upgraded with Alstom's Agate train control and communication technology. The pantographs on most of these locomotives were also replaced by the single arm type.^[4]

The Series 1 and Series 2 Class 9Es can be visually distinguished from each other by their bogies, which were redesigned for the Series 2 locomotives.^[1]

Service

Class 9E locomotives are used on the 861 kilometres (535 miles) Sishen-Saldanha iron ore line, to haul export ore from the open cast iron mines at Sishen in the Northern Cape to the harbour at Saldanha in the Western Cape. Most of the route is across the hot and dry Northern Cape, but the last 75 kilometres (47 miles) to Saldanha runs parallel to the Atlantic coastline and is subjected to the fog and salt sea air of the West Coast.^[3][5]

In South Africa, the Sishen-Saldanha line is unusual for several reasons.

• Construction, which began in 1973, was not undertaken by the SAR, but by the South African Iron and Steel Corporation (ISCOR), who operated the line with diesel-electric motive power. Operations on the Sishen-Saldanha iron ore line was only taken over from ISCOR by the SAR in 1977.
• It was electrified by the SAR at 50 kV AC, compared to the 25 kV AC high voltage which was used in other parts of the country.
• At the time, it was the longest 50 kV AC electrified railway line in the world.^[3]
• It is the only line in South Africa where electric and diesel-electric locomotives are consisted in mixed power use.^[6]

Mixed power

On the Sishen–Saldanha Orex line, General Electric (GE) Classes 34 series and 43-000 diesel-electric locomotives run consisted to Classes 9E and 15E electric locomotives, to haul the 342 truck iron ore trains. Each truck has a 100-ton capacity and the trains are at least 3.72 kilometres (2.31 miles) in length, powered by mixed consists of Classes 9E and 15E electric and GE type U26C Classes 34-000, 34-400, 34-500 and 34-900 and GE type C30ACi Class 43-000 diesel-electric locomotives.^[1][4][5][6]

Ore train about 100 kilometres (62 miles) north of Lamberts Bay

A Class 9E or Class 15E electric locomotive serves as the master of each mixed electric and diesel-electric consist, with a total of between nine and twelve locomotives per train, twelve being the maximum number allowed. Before the Class 15E was placed in service in 2010, motive power usually consisted of three sets of locomotives, each set made up of one or two Class 9E electrics and one or two Class 34 diesel-electrics, with each set’s leading electric locomotive controlling its respective set of diesel-electrics by means of a slimkabel (smart cable). In effect, each ore train was made up of three separate 114 truck trains consisted together, with the locomotives of all three trains controlled by means of a Locotrol radio distributed power control system by one crew in the leading electric locomotive. A typical train would therefore be made up of locomotive set A, 114 trucks, locomotive set B, 114 trucks, locomotive set C, and 114 trucks.^[1][4][6][7]

Some problems were experienced using this configuration, and after a couple of major derailments, the locomotive configuration was changed to four sets, with locomotive set D initially made up of two Class 34 diesel-electric locomotives at the rear end of the train, pushing at between 40% and 50% of tractive power at all times, depending on the grades being traversed. The total maximum number allowed was still between nine and twelve locomotives per train.^[1][4]

As more Class 15Es were delivered and placed in service, Class 9E or Class 15E electrics replaced the pair of Class 34 diesel-electrics in set D. At the same time, the more powerful Classes 15E electric and 43-000 diesel-electric locomotives also made it possible to use as few as seven locomotives per train, with locomotive sets A, B and C each made up of one Class 15E or 9E and one Class 34 or 43-000, and set D of a single Class 9E or 15E.^[1][4]

Illustration

The main picture shows no. E9003 in Spoornet blue livery with solid numbers, at the Erts yard near Kathu on 5 October 2015.

• 
  No. E9006 in SAR Gulf Red livery near Dingleton, Northern Cape, 14 May 2006
• 
  Rear end view of no. E9007, Salkor yard, Saldanha, 19 August 2010
• 
  No. E9012 on workshop bogies during servicing, Saldanha, 26 July 2009

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to South African Class 9E Series 1.

Locomotives of South Africa
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Electric	Amcoal Class E38 SAR Class ES SAR Class ES1 SAR Class Exp-AC SAR Class 1E SAR Class 2E SAR Class 3E SAR Class 4E SAR Class 5E s1 SAR Class 5E s2 SAR Class 5E s3 SAR Class 5E1 s1 SAR Class 5E1 s2 SAR Class 5E1 s3 SAR Class 5E1 s4 SAR Class 5E1 s5 SAR Class 6E SAR Class 6E1 s1 SAR Class 6E1 s2 SAR Class 6E1 s3 SAR Class 6E1 s4 SAR Class 6E1 s5 SAR Class 6E1 s6 SAR Class 6E1 s7 SAR Class 6E1 s8 SAR Class 6E1 s9 SAR Class 6E1 s10 SAR Class 6E1 s11 SAR Class 7E SAR Class 7E1 SAR Class 7E2 s1 SAR Class 7E2 s2 SAR Class 7E3 s1 SAR Class 7E3 s2 Spoornet Class 7E4 SAR Class 8E SAR Class 9E s1 SAR Class 9E s2 SAR Class 10E SAR Class 10E1 s1 Spoornet Class 10E1 s2 SAR Class 10E2 SAR Class 11E SAR Class 12E Spoornet Class 14E Spoornet Class 14E1 TFR Class 15E Spoornet Class 16E Spoornet Class 17E Spoornet Class 18E s1 TFR Class 18E s2 TFR Class 19E TFR Class 20E TFR Class 21E TFR Class 22E
Gas-electric	SAR Gas-electric
Diesel	3' 6" gauge Diesel-electric PRASA Class Afro 4000 SAR Class DS SAR Class DS1 SAR Class 31-000 SAR Class 32-000 SAR Class 32-200 SAR Class 33-000 SAR Class 33-200 SAR Class 33-400 SAR Class 34-000 SAR Class 34-200 SAR Class 34-400 SAR Class 34-500 SAR Class 34-600 SAR Class 34-800 SAR Class 34-900 SAR Class 35-000 SAR Class 35-200 SAR Class 35-400 SAR Class 35-600 TFR Class 35-800 SAR Class 36-000 SAR Class 36-200 SAR Class 37-000 Spoornet Class 39-000 TFR Class 39-200 TFR Class 43-000 TFR Class 44-000 2' gauge Diesel-electric SAR Class 91-000 3' 6" gauge Diesel-hydraulic SAR Class 61-000 3' 6" gauge Electro-diesel Spoornet Class 38-000
List of South African locomotive classes South African locomotive numbering and classification