The

Nederlandse Spoorwegen (, , NS ) is the principal passenger railway operator in the Netherlands. It is a Dutch state-owned company founded in 1938. The rail infrastructure is maintained by network manager ProRail, which was split off from NS in 2003. Freight operato ...

(NS) Class 1500 were built by

Metropolitan-Vickers Metropolitan-Vickers, Metrovick, or Metrovicks, was a British heavy electrical engineering company of the early-to-mid 20th century formerly known as British Westinghouse. Highly diversified, it was particularly well known for its industrial el ...

in 1953–1955. They were originally built for

British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. Originally a trading brand of the Railway Executive of the British Transport Commis ...

(BR) as Class EM2 (later Class 77) for use on the Woodhead Route between

Manchester Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...

and

Sheffield Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, situated south of Leeds and east of Manchester. The city is the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire and some of its so ...

. They were withdrawn by BR in 1969 and acquired by NS in 1969 following a locomotive shortage.

Description

Seven locomotives of this type were constructed. Construction took place at Gorton Works,

with electrical equipment supplied by

. They had been withdrawn en masse in September 1968 by BR, and were stored at Bury in the hope of sale to a foreign railway. Around this time, NS had been suffering from a shortage of electric locomotives. In August 1969, Dutch officials inspected no. E27002, which then performed a test run between Sheffield and

Reddish Reddish is an area of the Metropolitan Borough of Stockport, Greater Manchester, England, south-east of Manchester city centre. At the 2011 United Kingdom census, 2011 census, the population was 28,052. Historic counties of England, Historical ...

. NS were so impressed that they purchased all seven locomotives. The class was shipped to the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

in September 1969 by ferry from

Harwich Harwich is a town in Essex, England, and one of the Haven ports on the North Sea coast. It is in the Tendring district. Nearby places include Felixstowe to the north-east, Ipswich to the north-west, Colchester to the south-west and Clacton-o ...

Zeebrugge Zeebrugge (; from , meaning "Bruges-on-Sea"; , ) is a village on the coast of Belgium and a subdivision of Bruges, for which it is the modern port. Zeebrugge serves as both the international port of Bruges-Zeebrugge and a seafront resort with ...

. They were then tripped to

Tilburg Tilburg () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands, in the southern Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Brabant. With a population of 22 ...

workshops for assessment and repairs. One locomotive, no. E27005 ''Minerva'' was considered to be beyond economical repair and consequently broken up for spare parts. The remaining six locomotives entered the workshops for various modifications, including the fitting of Dutch headlight clusters, new

pantograph A pantograph (, from their original use for copying writing) is a Linkage (mechanical), mechanical linkage connected in a manner based on parallelograms so that the movement of one pen, in tracing an image, produces identical movements in a se ...

s and a new braking system. Driving controls were also relocated from the left side of the cab to the right. They were renumbered in the 1500 series (1500 representing 1,500 V DC overhead) in the order they left their workshops, starting with E27003 as 1501 in May 1970 and ending with E27002 as 1506 in June 1971. The 1500s were primarily used on services in the southern part of the

. Typical passenger duty was

Den Haag The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

Venlo Venlo () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in southeastern Netherlands, close to the border with Germany. It is situated in the province of Limburg (Netherlands), ...

. Freight duties were mainly operated at night and included Rotterdam Kijfhoek (freightyard) to

Roosendaal Roosendaal () is both a city and a municipality in the southern Netherlands, in the province of North Brabant. Towns/villages of the municipality * Roosendaal (population: 66,760) * Wouw (4,920) * Heerle (1,900) * Nispen (1,440) * Wouwse ...

. By the early 1980s, new electric locomotives in the form of Class 1600 were being introduced. The 1500s were therefore made obsolete and withdrawals started in 1985. The final locomotives were withdrawn in 1986.

Fleet details

Modelling the NS 1500 Class

Dutch manufacturer Philotrain offered a high quality certified small series brass model in the 1980s, which sold out fairly quickly. These models rarely appear for sale and consequently fetch premium prices. The model is in

H0 scale HO or H0 is a rail transport modelling scale using a 1:87 scale (3.5 mm to 1 foot). It is the most popular scale of model railway in the world. The rails are spaced apart for modelling standard gauge tracks and trains in HO. The ...

. Another Dutch manufacturer, KleiNSpoor, offered a resin and plastic based model, based on Athearn parts, as kits and ready-to-run versions, starting in the late 1990s. The model has been temporarily out of production as Athearn ceased delivery of parts, but it has now re-appeared in the KleiNSpoor catalogue as partially complete kit only. The model is in

References

External links

Description of the class

Website of the EM2 Society

Website of the Werkgroep Loc 1501
{{NS locos

1500 Year 1500 ( MD) was a leap year starting on Wednesday in the Julian calendar. The year 1500 was not a leap year in the proleptic Gregorian calendar. The year 1500 was the last year of the 15th century and the first year of the 16th century. ...

1500 V DC locomotives Co′Co′ locomotives Co-Co locomotives Metropolitan-Vickers locomotives Electric locomotives of the Netherlands Preserved electric locomotives Standard-gauge locomotives of the Netherlands Railway locomotives introduced in 1953 Co′Co′ electric locomotives of Europe