South African Class 43-000

A tendering process in 2006 and 2007 had selected Electro-Motive Sibanye, a joint venture between Electro-Motive Diesel (EMD) and Sibanye Trade and Services, as preferred bidder to supply two hundred and twelve locomotives for Transnet Freight Rail (TFR). Sibanye was a South African Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) front company, dealing with locomotives and spare parts. However, this agreement was cancelled amid reports and then confirmation of tender irregularities.[5][6]

A new tendering process was initiated, which invited three locomotive manufacturers, EMD, General Electric (GE) and Siemens, to bid for a contract to build 100 diesel-electric locomotives. In 2009, GE was announced as being the successful bidder.[7]

The Class 43-000 GE type C30ACi diesel-electric locomotive was designed by GE Transportation, a division of GE. The first ten locomotives were built by GE in Erie, Pennsylvania. They were delivered in January and April 2011 and were numbered in the range from 43-001 to 43-010.[8][9][10]

The remainder were built by Transnet Engineering (TE) and GE South African Technologies (GESAT) at the Koedoespoort shops of TE in Pretoria, numbered in the range from 43-011 to 43-100. The first of these, 43-011, was rolled out in July 2011.

At the beginning of 2012, the contract was extended for the construction of a further 43 locomotives, to be numbered in the range from 43-101 to 43-143.[11]

Upon completion of the first two TFR orders, the TE production line at Koedoespoort continued to manufacture C30ACi diesel-electric locomotives for customers elsewhere on the African continent. Since the C30ACi was the latest state-of-the-art GE locomotive specifically designed and built for Cape gauge which is widely used in West and Southern Africa, potential customers may include Ghana, Nigeria, Congo-Brazzaville, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola, Mozambique, Malawi, Zambia, Botswana, Namibia, South-western Tanzania and Zimbabwe.[12] The first customers other than TFR were Kumba Iron Ore and Caminhos de Ferro de Moçambique.

In 2014, TFR placed a third order for a further 60 class 43-000 locomotives from TE, to increase its fleet to 203 units.[13][14]

Driver's station of no. 43-171

The locomotives were constructed with both safety and crew comfort in mind. The cab is equipped with a "Loco-cam", an air conditioner, a refrigerator located adjacent to the cab front door, and a toilet in the form of a "Porta Potti" with a floor drain to wayside.[1]

The GE type C30ACi was the first AC diesel-electric locomotive to be introduced in Sub-Saharan Africa and also the first to meet with the emission standard of the International Union of Railways (Union Internationale des Chemins de fer, UIC). It met with the emission standards for brake-specific nitrogen oxides, unburned hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and particulate matter. The locomotives were expected to be more fuel-efficient and to produce lower emissions than typical diesel-electric locomotives operating in South Africa until then.[15]

Compared to the, on average, thirty-year-old existing TFR diesel-electric locomotive fleet at the time, the Class 43-000 also offered a greater continuous tractive effort and a higher adhesion capability, allowing the same amount of freight to be hauled with fewer locomotives by replacing four of the older locomotives with three of the new models.[16][17]

Transnet Freight Rail's Class 43-000 was initially placed in service on the line from the Mpumalanga Lowveld via Swaziland to Richards Bay and, during 2012, also on the Sishen-Saldanha iron ore export (Orex) line.[18] In May 2013, new Class 43-000s were also observed at the Pyramid South locomotive depot north of Pretoria.

In November 2013, six of these C30ACi diesel-electric locomotives, also built at Transnet Engineering's Koedoespoort shops, were delivered to Kumba Iron Ore to be used to shunt iron ore trains at its Sishen mine in the Northern Cape. The locomotives, numbered in the range from F123-0100 to F123-0600, were painted in a dark blue livery with yellow sills and handrails. They replaced ten older locomotives which were hired from Transnet and used in pairs for loading operations. A single C30ACi can be used to load trains of 114 ore wagons each, a task which earlier required two locomotives.[3]

In December 2013, the first four of ten of these C30ACi locomotives were delivered from Transnet Engineering to Caminhos de Ferro de Moçambique, the Mozambican railways, for use on its southern network out of Maputo. The locomotives, numbered in the range from D701 to D710, were acquired to make the railway less dependent on hired locomotives from South Africa and India. The Mozambican locomotives are 9 tonnes lighter than those of TFR, with bogies fabricated by UGL in Australia and different traction motors.[4]