C.F. L'Afrique Occidentale Beyer-Garratt Locomotives in Senegal_and_Ivory_Coast

Class 93 (Locobase 740)

Data from Gavin Hamilton's excellent compilation of Garratt data posted at [] (6 September 2005); and A[rthur] E[dward] Durrant, Garratt Locomotives of the World (revised edition) (Newton Abbott, UK: David & Charles, 1981), p. 104. Works numbers were 2715-2724 in 1938. Two more batches of the same design followed: 93.211-93.220 (2731-2740) in 1939 and 93.221-93.227 (2748-2754) in 1941.

Smaller Double Mountain Garratts headed for metre-gauge operation in West Africa. They hauled trains in Senegal (Dakar-NIger Line) and Ivory Coast (Abijan-Bobo Dioubasso Railway).

Durrant described them as "handsome engines ...noticeably from the same stable as the streamlined Algerian Garratts." Design details included a wood-burning Bekpaire firebox, skyline casing, and double chimneys (stack) mounted transversely (side by side) over the smokebox.

"Despite their small wheels," wrote Durrant, "speeds up to 62 mph [100 kph] were attained on trial." [Locobase notes that the 93s' drivers would have been turning at 408 rpm at that speed.] A 93 could move 400 tons of trailing load up 1 in 40 (2 1/2%) grades.

All the engines operating in Senegal ultimately ended up on Ivory Coast railways.