Newag Dragon

The main railway freight locomotive in Poland is the six-axle ET22 electric locomotive, which has had over 1000 units built between 1969-1989 at the Pafawag company in Wrocław.[1] In later years, the company, which is the main producer of electric locomotives, ceased production of heavy freight locomotives, building only four-axle passenger electric locomotives of the EP09 type(up to 1997), dual-mode EU43 and EU11 locomotive. These two latter ones, which had been built for the railway between 1997 and 2002 after the acquisition of Pafawag by Adtranz, did not make it to Poland due to financial problems at the time they were ordered. In 2002, Bombadier acquired Adtranz-Pafawag; the decision was then made not to produce electric locomotives in Wrocław.

From 2002 no electric locomotives were produced in Poland until[2]September 2006, when an agreement was signed with the Ministry of Science and Higher Education for funding a project to build a new locomotive. It was decided to produce a train dedicated to heavy freight. The company also decided to produce a six-axle locomotive[3] so that it could operate on a wider variety of tracks. The project for the locomotive was prepared in cooperation with the EC manufacturer and the Institute of Electrical Engineering. The traction engines were designed by the Research and Development Centre of Electrical Machines Komel[4] and built by the Department of Electrical Machines Emit.[5]

E6ACT-008 produced for Lotos Kolej at the InnoTrans Trade Fair, 2014

From 13 January to 30 December 2011 the supervised operation prototype unit, was led by STK, PKP Cargo, Pol-Miedz Trans and Lotos Kolej, under which E6ACT-001 had been in service for a combined 77 866 km with a maximum train weight of 4 021 t. In October, the locomotive was re-launched at the Trako Trade Fair in Gdańsk. On the 23 December the Railway Transport Office issued a perpetual license for the service of the locomotive. In February 2012 promotional operation was taken by DB Schenker Rail Poland.[6] At the InnoTrans Trade Fair in September 2014 the locomotive of the E6ACT-008 series belonging to Lotos Kolej was shown [7].

In July 2018 the Dragon 2 was introduced by Newag, a slightly revised design that carried the designation E6ACTa.[8] Three units were immediately purchased by PKP Cargo[9] and delivered in October 2018. They bear PKP-style designations: ET25-001 through -003.

The locomotives are available in versions powered by:

• DC voltage of 3 kV (type E6DCU originally E6ACT).
• AC voltage of 15 or 25 kV (type E6ACU).
• DC voltage of 3 kV and AC voltage of 15 or 25 kV (type E6MSU).
• Diesel (version with limited power including continuous traction power with the maximum speed of the load). However, the company produced the locomotives powered by DC with the E6ACT series.[11]

The manufacturer also provides 2 options for improvement:

• Max load - increasing the traction force to 450 kN.
• Dual power - with an additional combustion engine.[12]

The E6ACT locomotive is designed to operate at a supply voltage of 3 kV DC. The locomotive traction has IGBT technology. The first unit of the locomotive is powered by 6 STX500-4A electric engines with a capacity of 834 kW each, which is powered by traction converters developed by the Institute of Electrical Engineering. The gear axle SET 553 is supplied by Voith. The locomotives are equipped with disc brakes.[13]

The E6ACT/E6ACU locomotive has a continuous power of 5,004 MW and a starting tractive effort of 375 kN, making it able to pull 4,000 tonnes of cargo - or 4,500 with Max Load option.[14]