South African Class 34-800

The Class 34-800 type GT26MC diesel-electric locomotive was designed by General Motors Electro-Motive Division and built for the South African Railways (SAR) and Iscor by General Motors South Africa (GMSA) in Port Elizabeth. The first fifty were delivered between August 1978 and December 1979, numbered in the range from 34-801 to 34-850. In 1979, one more of the same type was placed in service by Iscor. Between April and July 1980, a further eight of these locomotives were delivered to the South African Railways, numbered in the range from 34-851 to . ==Distinguishing features==

on no. Of the GM-EMD Class 34 family of locomotives, Classes and South African Class 34-600| locomotives are visually indistinguishable from one another, but they can be distinguished from the Class by the thicker fishbelly-shaped sills on their left sides compared to the straight sill on the left side of the Class . ==Rebuilding and modification==

Class 39-000 The Class 39-000 type GT26CU-3 diesel-electric locomotives were to be rebuilt from Class , and South African Class 37-000| locomotives. The project commenced in 2005, using suitable frames from wrecked locomotives. Rebuilding was done at the Transwerk shops in Bloemfontein between 2006 and 2008. It was intended to produce one hundred Class but in spite of the technical success of the project, rebuilding was halted after completing the first five locomotives due to higher than anticipated cost. Two of these five were rebuilt from Class locomotives. It was decided, instead of rebuilding old locomotives, to rather build fifty new Class locomotives from imported and locally produced components. Traction motor upgrade In 2010, a project commenced at the Koedoespoort Transnet Rail Engineering shops to upgrade Class locomotives by, amongst other modifications, replacing the GM-EMD D29B with GM-EMD D31 traction motors, thereby improving their performance to the standard of the Class . The upgraded locomotives could initially be distinguished by the running board mounted handrails which were installed on the right side only during the upgrade. ==Service==

South African Railways In SAR, Spoornet and Transnet Freight Rail (TFR) service, the Class worked on most mainlines and some unelectrified branchlines in the central, eastern, northern and northeastern parts of the country. NLPI Limited NLPI Limited, abbreviated from New Limpopo Projects Investments, a Mauritius-registered company, specialises in private sector investments by using the build-operate-transfer (BOT) concept. It had three connected railway operations in Zimbabwe and Zambia, which formed a rail link between South Africa and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Iscor In 1979, one Class locomotive was delivered new to Iscor's Newcastle steel works in Natal, numbered . ==Works numbers==

The works numbers of the Class as well as their known disposal and deployment are displayed in the table. ==Liveries==

The Class 34-800 were all delivered in the SAR Gulf Red livery with signal red buffer beams, yellow side stripes on the long hood sides and a yellow V on each end. In the 1990s many of them began to be repainted in the Spoornet orange livery with a yellow and blue chevron pattern on the buffer beams. Some later received the Spoornet Traction maroon livery. In the late 1990s a few were repainted in the Spoornet blue livery with outline numbers on the long hood sides. After 2008 in the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) era, at least one was repainted in the PRASA blue livery. ==Illustration==

File:SAR Class 34-800 34-810.JPG|No. 34-810 in the Spoornet orange livery at Capital Park yard, Pretoria, Gauteng, 9 May 2006 File:SAR Class 34-800 34-839 Right.JPG|Upgraded no. 34-839 in Spoornet maroon livery at Sentrarand, Gauteng, 22 September 2009 File:SAR Class 34-800 34-819.JPG|No. 34-819 in Spoornet maroon with NLPI Logistics emblems at Koedoespoort, 2 October 2009 File:Class 34-800 34-847.jpg|No. 34-847 in PRASA's backdrop blue livery, Bloemfontein, 18 September 2015 ==References==