page_title: DRG Class 44
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: DRG Class 44 / History
caption_attribution_description: English: DB 044 014-9 on the turntable at Trier Ehrang, Easter 1972
context_page_description: The Class 44 was a ten-coupled, heavy goods train steam locomotive built for the Deutsche Reichsbahn as a standard steam engine class. Its sub-class was G 56.20 and it had triple cylinders. It was intended for hauling goods trains of up to 1,200 tonnes on the routes through Germany's hilly regions and up to 600 tonnes on steep inclines.
context_section_description: The first 10 examples were built in 1926. These engines had a somewhat higher steam consumption than the first ten units of the DRG Class 43 procured in parallel for comparison purposes, and which were equipped with two cylinders. Not until 1937 were further 44s procured, because by then the rising demands of rail transportation could be better met with a triple-cylinder configuration.
  From 1926 to 1949, a total of 1,989 locomotives were manufactured. During the Second World War an austerity variant was built with simplified construction and delivery, known as the Class 44ÜK (one of the so-called Übergangskriegslokomotive). This primarily used home-produced materials; components were simplified, both in manufacturing methods and design, or left out completely. The most striking features of the ÜK locomotives were the omission of the smoke deflectors (that from 44 013 was standard) and also the forward side windows of the driver's cab.
  After the war, Class 44 locomotives remained with the following railway administrations:
  DB (from 09/1949): 1,242 units
  DR (East Germany): 335 units
  PKP: 67 units (classified as Ty4)
  ČSD: 3 units
  ÖBB: 11 units
  SNCF: 15 units (classified as Class 150 X alongside with 226 units found on assembly lines in French factories)
  SNCB: 1 unit (war booty), traded back to West Germany in 1950 but sent to France in 1952
  The Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) gave 9 engines back to the Deutsche Bundesbahn (DB) in 1952.
  The DB transferred at least 291 engines to the French railways SNCF as reparations. These were predominantly locomotives that had been built in France, most of them never ran and were probably scrapped. The SNCF sold on 48 engines in 1955 to the Turkish State Railway (TCDD).
  Until their replacement by modern diesel and electric locomotives, the Class 44 engines were the backbone of heavy goods train duties in Germany.
  German railwaymen nicknamed the Class 44 locomotive the "Jumbo" because of its power. Only the rebuilt (Reko) locomotives of East Germany's Class 58.30, converted between 1958 and 1962, attained the performance of the Class 44s, at least on the plains.
caption: DB 044 014-9 on the turntable at Trier, Easter 1972
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