Alco Diesel converted to Electric

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jis

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Certainly any re-purposing of costly items rather than simple scrapping is to be welcomed.

I am surprised that the original motors and controls would work on 25KV, although I have no idea of the output voltages or currents of Diesel Electric locos. Maybe they use some voltage dropping gear from the panto?

I always liked and respected the recycling of used items that I saw in India, this seems another sensible money saving move.

Some of the Diesel engined locos spew out huge clouds of the most terrible black oily smoke too!

Ed.
 
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Certainly any re-purposing of costly items rather than simple scrapping is to be welcomed.

I am surprised that the original motors and controls would work on 25KV, although I have no idea of the output voltages or currents of Diesel Electric locos. Maybe they use some voltage dropping gear from the panto?

I always liked and respected the recycling of used items that I saw in India, this seems another sensible money saving move.

Some of the Diesel engined locos spew out huge clouds of the most terrible black oily smoke too!

Ed.
Technically it is pretty straightforward. The diesel alternator feeds the drive circuitry which drives the DC motors. Basically the HV gear has to convert from 25kV to the appropriate voltage profile to emulate what was originally fed by the diesel alternator.

But my suspicion is that they probably replaced the original control circuitry and have inserted new circuitry to run the DC motors through power electronics from a 1,500v - 3,000v DC bus. The HV side simply steps down from 25kV and rectifies to feed the DC bus.

It would be interesting to see how they did it.
 
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