British Rail 18000 was a prototype mainline gas turbine-electric locomotive built for British Railways in 1949 by Brown, Boveri & Cie. An earlier gas-turbine locomotive, 18100, had been ordered from Metropolitan-Vickers by the Great Western Railway but construction was delayed due to World War II; a second, 18000, was thus ordered from Switzerland in 1946. It spent its working life on the Western Region of British Railways, operating express passenger services from Paddington station, London.
British Rail 18000 at Didcot Railway Centre on 6 August 2011
18000 at Bellinzona, Switzerland (1967)
18000 at Vienna in 1989
British Rail 18000 at Barrow Hill in 2009
A gas turbine locomotive is a type of railway locomotive in which the prime mover is a gas turbine. Several types of gas turbine locomotive have been developed, differing mainly in the means by which mechanical power is conveyed to the driving wheels (drivers). A gas turbine train typically consists of two power cars, and one or more intermediate passenger cars.
A 44-ton 1-B-1 experimental gas turbine locomotive designed by R. Tom Sawyer and built in 1952 for testing by the U.S. Army Transportation Corps
UP 18, a gas turbine-electric locomotive preserved at the Illinois Railway Museum
Diagram of a gas turbine-electric locomotive
1942 publicity photo of Am 4/6 number 1101