The FS Class E.360 were

electric locomotive An electric locomotive is a locomotive powered by electricity from overhead lines, a third rail or on-board energy storage such as a battery or a supercapacitor. Locomotives with on-board fuelled prime movers, such as diesel engines or g ...

s of the

Italian State Railways Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane S.p.A. ( "Italian Railways of the State"; previously only Ferrovie dello Stato, hence the abbreviation FS) is Italy's national state-owned railway holding company that manages transport, infrastructure, real estat ...

(FS), using three-phase alternating current, built for the operation of the Valtellina line. They were ordered by Rete Adriatica (the Adriatic Network) and were originally numbered RA 361–363. Italian railways were nationalized in 1905 and they then became FS E.361-363 They were leased to Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) in 1906 and returned to Italy in 1907.

Overview

The locomotives were built for the Valtellina Railway, a 106 km long line with many tunnels and curves. Hungarian engineer

Kálmán Kandó Kálmán Kandó de Egerfarmos et Sztregova (''egerfarmosi és sztregovai Kandó Kálmán''; 10 July 1869 – 13 January 1931) was a Hungarian engineer, the inventor of phase converter and a pioneer in the development of AC electric railway tract ...

electrified the line in the early 1900s using high voltage three-phase alternating current.

Lease to SBB

The three locomotives were leased to the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) between 1906 and 1907 for the purpose of operating in the

Simplon tunnel , it, Galleria del Sempione , line = Simplon line, (Lötschberg railway line) , location = Traversing the Lepontine Alps between Switzerland and Italy , coordinates = – , system = Swiss Federal Railways (SBB CFF ...

. The testing of the Simplon line was carried out on 25 January 1906 by a train pulled by a steam locomotive. On the following 26 April, the first test with an electric locomotive was carried out. The choice of the three-phase system was made by Swiss railway technicians after the visits they made to the Italian lines of the Valtellina. The Swiss had no three-phase locomotives of their own at the time so they asked for, and obtained on hire from the newly constituted Italian State Railways, the three new locomotives E.361, 362 and 363. The locomotives gave excellent service on the Simplon line, hauling over 10 trains a day. The only problem was with the

current collector Electric current collectors are used by trolleybuses, trams, electric locomotives or EMUs to carry electrical power from overhead lines, electrical third rails, or ground-level power supplies to the electrical equipment of the vehicles. Those for ...

s. The original

Ganz The Ganz Works or Ganz ( or , ''Ganz companies'', formerly ''Ganz and Partner Iron Mill and Machine Factory'') was a group of companies operating between 1845 and 1949 in Budapest, Hungary. It was named after Ábrahám Ganz, the founder and th ...

collectors did not collect current reliably so they were replaced by

Brown-Boveri Brown, Boveri & Cie. (Brown, Boveri & Company; BBC) was a Swiss group of electrical engineering companies. It was founded in Zürich, in 1891 by Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown and Walter Boveri who worked at the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon. In 1970 ...

collectors.

Return to Italy

Locomotive E.363 returned to Valtellina in May 1907 and E.361 and E.362 respectively in October and November of the same year.

Overview

Lease to SBB

Return to Italy

See also

References

Further reading