Old Soviet habits
& my first autumnal picture of the year.
It's no secret, that Soviet locos usually smoked a lot. It was no different for M62 locomotives. Due to being well upkept in Poland, the smoking was reduced massively and the only smoke present was the white one from burning up oil (a natural process in two-stroke engines).
With the modernisation of ST44 locomotives in the PESA works in Bydgoszcz, they were being upgraded to the ST44Ko standard. The 'Ko' stands for Коломна - a Russian city, where the new, four-stroke 12CzN26/26 engine for the new M62 variant was produced. For this very reason, the M62Ko/ST44Ko locomotives, which are now the most numerous on Polish rails, compared to other M62 variants.
Everyone had thought, that a new engine would mean less smoke, but it turned out to be right the opposite. Each new ST44 locomotive modernised in the PESA works was smoking more and more. It also seems to be the characteristic of the upgraded Ko locomotives in the fleet of the РЖД, and there is seemingly no way to fix this :p.
Another fun fact is that there are 2 versions of the ST44Ko in PKP Cargo, reffered to among railfans as the "Old Kołomna" (ST44-1201-1251) and "New Kołomna" (1252+). The latter is also often simply called "HIV". The "new" Kołomnas have a complete redesign of headlight casings and the AC unit. As a result, they look way uglier.
Here the last representative of the "Old Kołomna" series, ST44-1251 is climbing up the heavy incline leading to the station Lipusz, where its journey ends. On hook was the loaded cement train TMS 454031 from Działoszyn. The wagons were to be picked up by the SKPL SM42 to the prefabs factory in Osława-Dąbrowa, but it hadn't arrived due to trackworks on the siding.
Photo by Piotrek/Toprus
Old Soviet habits
& my first autumnal picture of the year.
It's no secret, that Soviet locos usually smoked a lot. It was no different for M62 locomotives. Due to being well upkept in Poland, the smoking was reduced massively and the only smoke present was the white one from burning up oil (a natural process in two-stroke engines).
With the modernisation of ST44 locomotives in the PESA works in Bydgoszcz, they were being upgraded to the ST44Ko standard. The 'Ko' stands for Коломна - a Russian city, where the new, four-stroke 12CzN26/26 engine for the new M62 variant was produced. For this very reason, the M62Ko/ST44Ko locomotives, which are now the most numerous on Polish rails, compared to other M62 variants.
Everyone had thought, that a new engine would mean less smoke, but it turned out to be right the opposite. Each new ST44 locomotive modernised in the PESA works was smoking more and more. It also seems to be the characteristic of the upgraded Ko locomotives in the fleet of the РЖД, and there is seemingly no way to fix this :p.
Another fun fact is that there are 2 versions of the ST44Ko in PKP Cargo, reffered to among railfans as the "Old Kołomna" (ST44-1201-1251) and "New Kołomna" (1252+). The latter is also often simply called "HIV". The "new" Kołomnas have a complete redesign of headlight casings and the AC unit. As a result, they look way uglier.
Here the last representative of the "Old Kołomna" series, ST44-1251 is climbing up the heavy incline leading to the station Lipusz, where its journey ends. On hook was the loaded cement train TMS 454031 from Działoszyn. The wagons were to be picked up by the SKPL SM42 to the prefabs factory in Osława-Dąbrowa, but it hadn't arrived due to trackworks on the siding.
Photo by Piotrek/Toprus