Abstract :
The Hungarian engineering genius Dr. Kalman Kando was the first to create a railway-electrification system working at utility frequency and integrated into a public utility system. The key to his system was a locomotive on which a synchronous phase convertor changed the single-phase contact-wire energy to the polyphase-induction-traction-motor energy. The synchronous machine could run with unity power factor. The locomotives had a constant efficiency of 83% and regenerative braking. Three sections of the single-phase railway line took the three phases of the utility network. The Hungarian railway electrification based on Kando´s system was started with strong British support, and two of Britain´s largest manufacturers, Metropolitan-Vickers and English Electric, supplied a substantial part of the equipment.
