The GEC Stephenson locomotives are a type of heavy industrial

shunter A switcher, shunter, yard pilot, switch engine, yard goat, or shifter is a small railroad locomotive used for manoeuvring railroad cars inside a rail yard in a process known as ''switching'' (US) or ''shunting'' (UK). Switchers are not inten ...

built in the 1970s by British industrial company

GEC Traction GEC Traction Limited was a British industrial company formed in 1972 which designed and manufactured electric traction equipment for railway rolling stock. The company had manufacturing sites at Manchester, Preston and Sheffield and was a wholly ...

. The locomotives were used for heavy shunting tasks in UK industrial sites for clients including

British Steel Corporation British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

and the

National Coal Board The National Coal Board (NCB) was the statutory corporation created to run the nationalised coal mining industry in the United Kingdom. Set up under the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946, it took over the United Kingdom's collieries on "ve ...

History and design

The locomotives were available in 3- or 4-axle versions in the same frame, with a range of masses and engine powers, each axle was powered and the locomotives could be operated in multiple from a single cab. Most of the locomotives produced were 3 axle versions of two types - a 50-ton loco (16.5 ton axleload) with a 500 hp V8 cylinder Dorman 8QT engine, and a 75-ton (25 ton axleload) machine with a 12-cylinder engine rated at 750 hp. The NCB acquired both locomotive types. British Steel acquired the heavier 75 ton model; twenty five 750 hp locomotives were acquired by BSC Redcar primarily for hauling torpedo wagons. An ex- Barrington Cement Works ex-ICI locomotive named ''

Ludwig Mond Ludwig Mond FRS (7 March 1839 – 11 December 1909) was a German-born, British chemist and industrialist. He discovered an important, previously unknown, class of compounds called metal carbonyls. Education and career Ludwig Mond was born ...

'' was acquired in 2010 by the Rutland Railway Museum. As of 2012 locomotives of this type are still in service with

Tata Steel Europe Tata Steel Europe Ltd. (formerly Corus Group plc) was a steelmaking company headquartered in London, England, with its main operations in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. The company was created in 2007, when Tata Group took over the ...

in the UK. In January 2012 the steel works in Lackenby imported ten 1500 kW ex-

NSB Di8 The NSB Di 8 is a class of diesel-electric locomotives built by Maschinenbau Kiel (MaK), while it was part of Siemens Schienenfahrzeugtechnik, for the Norwegian State Railways (NSB). The locomotives are equipped with a Caterpillar 3516 DI-TA ...

Bo'Bo' locomotives for the torpedo wagon trains - this will result in several of the GEC locomotives being scrapped though some are expected to be retained for track renewal and shunting work.

Notes

References

External links

;Images *, Redcar steel, blue livery *, Redcar steel, yellow livery *, NCB blue livery {{General Electric Company plc GEC locomotives Industrial diesel locomotives of Great Britain Railway locomotives introduced in 1976 Shunting locomotives