page_title: Rhaetian Railway G 4/5
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Rhaetian Railway G 4/5 / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Alfred Ilg and his family at the train station in Dire Dawa. Italiano: Alfred Ilg e la sua famiglia alla stazione ferroviaria a Dire Dawa.
context_page_description: The Rhaetian Railway G 4/5 was a class of metre gauge 2-8-0 steam locomotives operated by the Rhaetian Railway, which is the main railway network in the Canton of Graubünden, Switzerland.
  The class was named G 4/5 under the Swiss locomotive and railcar classification system. According to that system, G 4/5 denotes a narrow gauge steam locomotive with a total of five axles, four of which are drive axles.
  The Rhaetian Railway procured a total of 29 examples of the G 4/5 class between 1904 and 1915. Built as tender locomotives by the Swiss Locomotive and Machine Works in Winterthur, the G 4/5s were used mainly on the Albula Railway until that line was electrified in 1919. Two preserved examples of the class are still in service on the Rhaetian Railway network today.
context_section_description: As early as 1902, the SLM manufactured two four-coupled saturated steam locomotives for the Imperial Railway Company of Ethiopia.  In the same year, trial runs using one of these locomotives were carried out on the Rhaetian Railway.  The positive results of these tests led the Board of the Rhaetian Railway to order four largely identical machines, at a price of 61,500 Swiss Francs per unit.  These G 4/5 class locomotives arrived in Graubünden between June and August 1904, and were given the operating numbers 101 to 104.
  The performance specifications for the G 4/5s stipulated that they be able to haul a trailing load of 90 tonnes (89 long tons; 99 short tons) at a speed of 18 kilometres per hour (11 mph) on a gradient of 3.5%, while on level sections a speed of 45 kilometres per hour (28 mph) should be reached.  Trial runs showed, however, that the machines were powerful enough to move the required load at as fast as 22 kilometres per hour (14 mph) on gradients, while on level sections a top speed of 52 kilometres per hour (32 mph) could be achieved.
  The continuing rise in traffic on the Rhaetian Railway soon required more powerful locomotives.  The company therefore decided in 1906 to purchase four further G 4/5s of higher performance than the initial batch.  Train loads of 95 tonnes (93 long tons; 105 short tons) were now required to be hauled up gradients of 3.5% at a top speed of 32 kilometres per hour (20 mph).  While the new G 4/5s nos 105 and 106 were manufactured in the traditional saturated steam configuration, nos 107 and 108 used superheated steam for the first time on the Rhaetian Railway.  The performance of the two new sub-types was similar. With each producing nearly 600 kilowatts (800 hp), they were regarded as the world's most powerful narrow gauge locomotives.
  As the superheated configuration for the class was now proven, all subsequently ordered G 4/5s were equipped with superheaters.  To 1915, a total of 21 further locomotives, in five separate orders, were so obtained.  The last locomotive, no 129, also received a preheater.  With a total of 29 examples, the G 4/5 also eventually became the largest single class of locomotives on the Rhaetian Railway to this day.
  In the meantime, coal shortages during World War I had called into question the further use of steam locomotives.  The Rhaetian Railway had therefore decided to electrify all of its lines on the model of the Engadine Railway, opened in 1913.  The electrification project was able to be completed in 1922.  In 1920, the now surplus locomotives nos. 109, 110 and 111 were sold to the Ferrocarril de la Robla in Spain, and in 1949 those locomotives were followed by nos 102 and 104 to 106.  In Spain, the G 4/5s remained in service until about 1970.  Meanwhile, in 1924, locomotives 101 and 103 went to Brazil.
  Locomotives 112 to 129 went in 1926 and 1927 to the Royal State Railways of Siam (now Thailand), where a few examples were in use up to the 1960s.  Locomotive 118 has since been preserved in Chiang Mai as a monument, and locomotive 123 has been kept for display in a railway museum.
  Only locomotives 107 and 108 remained at the Rhaetian Railway as non-catenary dependent reserves for snow removal, building work and goods trains.  Since the 1960s, they have also worked increasingly on special trains for railway enthusiasts.  Locomotive 107 is presently stationed in Landquart, while no 108 is based in Samedan.  On the occasion of the Graubünden Steam Festival 2006 and the simultaneous 100th anniversary of the Albula Railway, both locomotives were given names.  Since then, no 107 has carried the name Albula, and no 108 the name Engiadina.
caption: A locomotive of the type tested on the Rhaetian Railway, in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia
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