The Turbotrain was any of several French high-speed,

gas turbine train A gas turbine locomotive is a type of railway locomotive in which the prime mover is a gas turbine. Several types of gas turbine locomotive have been developed, differing mainly in the means by which mechanical power is conveyed to the driving w ...

s. The earliest Turbotrain entered service in 1967, for use on

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

SNCF The Société nationale des chemins de fer français (; abbreviated as SNCF ; French for "National society of French railroads") is France's national state-owned railway company. Founded in 1938, it operates the country's national rail traffi ...

intercity lines. There were four versions in total, with the last exiting service in 2005, and it is the Turbotrain that made advances possible for the

TGV The TGV (french: Train à Grande Vitesse, "high-speed train"; previously french: TurboTrain à Grande Vitesse, label=none) is France's intercity high-speed rail service, operated by SNCF. SNCF worked on a high-speed rail network from 1966 to 19 ...

TGS (''Turbine à gaz spéciale'') Prototype – XR 8575 trainset

In 1967, the SNCF converted a 2-car X 4300 Class

diesel multiple unit A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple-unit train powered by on-board diesel engines. A DMU requires no separate locomotive, as the engines are incorporated into one or more of the carriages. Diesel-powered single-unit railcars are also ...

train originally built by

ANF Industrie Alstom Crespin, formerly Bombardier Transport France and ANF Industrie, is a French rolling stock manufacturer based at Crespin, in Hauts-de-France region, France. The company was acquired by Bombardier Transportation in 1989, then by Alstom in 20 ...

(Ateliers Construction du Nord de la France) starting in 1963 (either train number X4375 or X4365), into the prototype experimental Turbotrain TGS (''Turbine à gaz spéciale'').Garvin, Brian; Fox, Peter; and Appleby, Chris. SNCF/French National Railways: Locomotives and Multiple Units. Sheffield, United Kingdom: Platform 5 Publishing; 1986. pp65, 96 The new gas-turbine engine was installed into the trailer car of this 2-car set; the original diesel power-car was fitted with a new cab but retained its original diesel motor and transmission. Trials started on 25 April 1967. The TGS reached on 15 October 1971.

Class T 1000 ETG (Élément à Turbine à Gaz) trains

This is the first-generation of production Turbotrains. These ETG (Elément à Turbine à Gaz) trains were four carriage trainsets which offered 188 seats and possessed one diesel engine and one gas turbine engine. The gas-turbine engine was an 820 kW

Turbomeca Safran Helicopter Engines, previously known as Turbomeca, is a French manufacturer of low- and medium-power gas turbine turboshaft engines for helicopters. The company also produces gas turbine engines for aircraft and missiles, as well as turbin ...

Turmo IIIF3 gas-turbine

Voith The Voith Group is a German manufacturer of machines for the pulp and paper industry, technical equipment for hydropower plants and drive and braking systems. The family-owned company, which operates worldwide and has its headquarters in Hei ...

hydraulic (derived from a helicopter turbine) and the diesel was a 320 kW Saurer SDHR diesel-mechanical.Garvin, Brian; Fox, Peter; and Appleby, Chris. SNCF/French National Railways: Locomotives and Multiple Units. Sheffield, United Kingdom: Platform 5 Publishing; 1986. p96. These trains reached . The ETGs entered service in 1971 on the

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

Caen Caen (, ; nrf, Kaem) is a commune in northwestern France. It is the prefecture of the department of Calvados. The city proper has 105,512 inhabitants (), while its functional urban area has 470,000,Cherbourg Cherbourg (; , , ), nrf, Chèrbourg, ) is a former commune and subprefecture located at the northern end of the Cotentin peninsula in the northwestern French department of Manche. It was merged into the commune of Cherbourg-Octeville on 28 Feb ...

. A total of 14 of these four-car trainsets were manufactured from 1969–1972 by

ANF ANF may refer to: Companies * ANF (real estate), a French property-management company * ANF Les Mureaux, a French aircraft manufacturer 1918–1937 * Ateliers du Nord de la France, a French locomotive manufacturer * Abercrombie & Fitch (NYSE symbo ...

. These trains were maintained at the Venissieux trainshed in Lyon for "many years", but were moved to the Lyon Vaise depot in the 1980s. Electrification of the Grenoble line caused some trainsets to be shifted to work in

Clermont Ferrand Clermont-Ferrand (, ; ; oc, label=Auvergnat, Clarmont-Ferrand or Clharmou ; la, Augustonemetum) is a city and commune of France, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, with a population of 146,734 (2018). Its metropolitan area (''aire d'attract ...

and

Metz Metz ( , , lat, Divodurum Mediomatricorum, then ) is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers. Metz is the prefecture of the Moselle department and the seat of the parliament of the Grand E ...

Class T 2000 RTG (Rame à Turbine à Gaz) trains

These trains had five carriages with 280 seats and were built between 1972 and 1976 by

and MTE (Societe de Materiel de Traction Electrique). Forty-one RTG trainsets were manufactured for SNCF service. These trains were equipped with one Turmo IIIF1 gas turbine in the even-numbered cabs and one Turmo XII gas turbine in the odd-numbered cabs, reaching . Normally, the even-numbered engine was shut down once the train reached cruising speeds. The RTG entered service in 1973 on the

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

Lyon Lyon,, ; Occitan: ''Lion'', hist. ''Lionés'' also spelled in English as Lyons, is the third-largest city and second-largest metropolitan area of France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of t ...

and

Nantes Nantes (, , ; Gallo: or ; ) is a city in Loire-Atlantique on the Loire, from the Atlantic coast. The city is the sixth largest in France, with a population of 314,138 in Nantes proper and a metropolitan area of nearly 1 million inhabita ...

lines, it subsequently entered service on the

and

Deauville Deauville () is a commune in the Calvados department, Normandy, northwestern France. Major attractions include its harbour, race course, marinas, conference centre, villas, Grand Casino, and sumptuous hotels. The first Deauville Asian Film Fes ...

- Dives-Cabourg lines in 1975. The electrification of the Paris-Caen-Cherbourg line in 1996 moved the RTGs onto the

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefectur ...

line until 2005. In later years, the SNCF RTG trainsets were modified to allow two RTG trains to be operated together by one driver as a

multiple-unit A multiple-unit train or simply multiple unit (MU) is a self-propelled train composed of one or more carriages joined together, which when coupled to another multiple unit can be controlled by a single driver, with multiple-unit train contr ...

train.

Export models

Six examples of the RTG were built by ANF for

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

and were dubbed

Turboliner The Turboliners were a family of gas turbine trainsets built for Amtrak in the 1970s. They were among the first new equipment purchased by Amtrak to update its fleet with faster, more modern trains. The first batch, known as RTG, were built by ...

s in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. These RTG Turboliners were first imported into the United States in 1973 and "impressed with their reliability"Allen, Geoffrey Freeman. The World's Fastest Trains: From the Age of Steam to the TGV. Somerset, United Kingdom: Patrick Stephens Limited; 1992. p143 and proliferated with further orders from France and license-production in the United States by Rohr. The

Egyptian National Railways Egyptian National Railways (ENR; ar, السكك الحديدية المصرية, Al-Sikak al-Ḥadīdiyyah al-Miṣriyyah) is the national railway of Egypt and managed by the parastatal Egyptian Railway Authority (ERA; ar, الهيئة الق� ...

purchased three enlarged 10-car turbotrains manufactured by ANF for a planned service on the 208 km route between

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

and

Alexandria Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandria ...

. However, the trackage is not suitable for such speeds, and the trains have been restricted to maximum and in the vicinity of Cairo.Abbott, James, editor. Jane's World Railways 1996–1997. Surrey, United Kingdom: Jane's Information Group; 1996. pp448-9 Four units of Turbotrains were introduced in

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

in 1974 with max speed of between

Tehran Tehran (; fa, تهران ) is the largest city in Tehran Province and the capital of Iran. With a population of around 9 million in the city and around 16 million in the larger metropolitan area of Greater Tehran, Tehran is the most popul ...

Mashhad Mashhad ( fa, مشهد, Mašhad ), also spelled Mashad, is the List of Iranian cities by population, second-most-populous city in Iran, located in the relatively remote north-east of the country about from Tehran. It serves as the capital of R ...

that later in 2008 were converted to DMUs by substitution of

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-call ...

s instead of turbines.

TGV 001 experimental high-speed train

This experimental Turbotrain

TGV 001 TGV 001 (''Train à Grande Vitesse 001'' ) was a high-speed railway train built in France. It was the first TGV prototype and was commissioned in 1969, to begin testing in 1972. The TGV 001 was an experimental gas turbine-electric locomotiv ...

set the world speed record for gas turbine-powered rail vehicles with on 8 December 1972. This TGV 001 was a five-car trainset which possessed four gas-turbine engines with a total output of and all axles motored. This train was extensively tested over more than running at over , of which almost half were covered at more than and a peak of . The research program from this prototype, and from the Z7001 Zebulon electric test train, provided data used for the design of the later electric

trains. The TGV 001 prototype was retired in January 1978; one power-car (TDu 001) from this trainset is preserved and is located at on the A4 highway exit number 50 Bischheim near

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

, France. The other power-car (TDu 002) is preserved and located at on the A36 highway exit number 13 (Belfort-Glacis du Château) near Belfort in the Territoire de Belfort, France.

Public reaction

The RTGs were well loved by the public and it is with regret and nostalgia that the Turbotrain was replaced by Corail trains. One RTG is kept in running condition at the French National Railway Museum in

Mulhouse Mulhouse (; Alsatian language, Alsatian: or , ; ; meaning ''Mill (grinding), mill house'') is a city of the Haut-Rhin Departments of France, department, in the Grand Est Regions of France, region, eastern France, close to the France–Switzerl ...

References

{{Use dmy dates, date=August 2019 SNCF multiple units High-speed trains of France Gas turbine multiple units of France