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A bit of international railroading. This is the GT1-001 gas turbine locomotive which is a 8300 kw (11,130 hp) locomotive. It is claimed that this is the most powerful, single prime mover locomotive in the world. The locomotive is arranged in a B-B-B+B-B-B wheel arrangement. The locomotive, what is claimed to be a world record for a single prime mover locomotive, pulled a train that was 16,000 metric tons (~17,500 US tons) and 170 cars long.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPatomyt6DQ

 

Here is what is said about the locomotive.

"One refueling of a locomotive with maximum power of 8.3 Megawatt and a weight of a machine-300 tons, is enough for 750 km. The power of GTEL makes it possible to lead the trains with 10000 tons weight and with fuel consumption, that is 30% less than fuel consumption of a diesel locomotive. The main advantage of GTEL is a possibility to reach high power with rather small size and weight. One more advantage is a possibility to use cheap fuel-liquefied gas."

 

This video, starting at 4:00, gives some views of the turbine and the controls and computers in the cab.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPatomyt6DQ

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Gotta love those Novotrans Russkie bathtub gons!  Leave it to Uncle Joe to finally trump the UP 8500GTELs after, what sixty some years at the top of the motive power heap. Now do we have the nads to step up to the plate with a sizzling counter-chooch???  Don't hold your breath, comrade!  Hey, FWIW, the base net rating of the frame size 5 GE turbine used in the 1-30 UP machines was (is) 10,700 HP.  Think we could tweak out a little bit more after all that time?  Dah !

Last edited by jaygee
Originally Posted by jaygee:

Gotta love those Novotrans Russkie bathtub gons!  Leave it to Uncle Joe to finally trump the UP 8500GTELs after, what sixty some years at the top of the motive power heap. Now do we have the nads to step up to the plate with a sizzling counter-chooch???  Don't hold your breath, comrade!  Hey, FWIW, the base net rating of the frame size 5 GE turbine used in the 1-30 UP machines was (is) 10,700 HP.  Think we could tweak out a little bit more after all that time?  Dah !

Well, Russia is not the only ones that have been investigating gas turbines. US railroading does not seem to be in an experimental mood so US railroads definitively will not be making an attempt at something like this anytime soon. So it is obviously no, there will not be any comparable counter-chooch in the US anytime soon. US is just getting started exploring LNG as a fuel (again), something that the Russians have been looking at for several years now and have seemingly solved some of the issues with the use of LNG.

 

Keep in mind the French TGV was gas turbine-electric powered. The gas turbine TGV set many speed records. However, due to world events and oil embargoes during the 1970's the switch was made to overhead electric power.  

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