The four-wheeled, battery-powered shunting engine (so called akkulok) was built in 1928 by company AEG for sugar factory in Witaszyce. The vehicle bears factory number 4184. It is of a quite simple design: two electric motors coupled via single stage gearboxes with axles, cramped driver cab with modest equipment with two battery boxes on each end. Engine was employed by a shunting works on the factory’s sidings. Over the years the appearance of the engine changed. Due to the many repairs and overhauls before early 1970’s, the engine had covers of the battery boxes replaced with simplified ones, and added electric lights in new casings.

When the engine concluded its service, PARE began efforts to add it to then started railway collection in Skierniewice’s Shed.  In April 1995 the vehicle arrived on the heavy-freight trailer in Skierniewice.

At the turn of 1997/1998 the renovation works began. First of all, the bodywork had to be painstakingly cleaned off of rust and old paint. Next come the coat of anti-corrosive paint. At that point, the vehicle started to look better, but it was still many years before more complex works could be started. In 2006, the engine arrived at the Warsaw’s Tram works – first the undercarriage, than the remaining parts of the body. The greatest attention had to be paid to the electrical equipment – engines and controls required lots of efforts to be brought back to life. A new roof and doors have been fitted to the bodywork. Still, finding a manufacturer willing to rebuild the driving resistors appeared to be a bit tricky.

In January 2014, the bodywork got the finish before the final coat of paint. New lights casings have been fitted. Two months later, the vehicle was painted in the final colors, both inside and outside. However, the electrical equipment was still in parts.

Al last in the beginning of summer, the renovation of the electrical equipment was completed and the engine could be assembled together. On 20^th June, the akkulok made its trial run on borrowed batteries, to check if the old controls work properly.

On 20^th September 2014, the engine was prepared to depart back to Skierniewice. Before loading on the heavy-freight trailer, last photos in front of Warsaw’s Tram works were taken. Due to the small sizes of the vehicle, the transportation to the Shed went effortlessly.

Thanks to the support of Warsaw’s Trams, the akkulok is the newest completely renovated  vehicle in PARE’s collection. The first public presentation of the engine took place during the Railwaymen Day, on 22^nd November.

While waiting for the coming Christmas and New Year, full of hope we are looking forward to the future. We would like to wish to our colleagues and supporters good health, cheerfulness and many successes in common aspirations.

PARE Board, Members and Volunteers

Life not always go as one would wish for – sometimes it is a matter of time and the lack of resources…. Unfortunately, the smoke stack of the pump house from 1880 gave up to the erosion caused by years of exposure to the rain and fumes. Due to the safety reasons, we were forced to call a specialists to carefully disassemble its top part. Nevertheless, we want to rebuild it to its original shape as this might be one of the last brick industrial smoke stacks in Skierniewice. Therefore, we are looking for sponsors who would like to support bringing this construction back to the Engine Shed’s skyline.

On 16^th December at the seat of Warsaw Trams we celebrated the successful rebuild of AEG battery shunting engine from 1928. The President of PARE, Judyta Kurowska-Ciechańska, expressed our gratitude to Mr Krzysztof Karosa and Mr Wojciech Pęsik for sponsoring and completing the renovation works of this unique vehicle from PARE’s collection. We honored also the employees of Warsaw Trams for their involvement in the rebuild. Once again we would like to thank our benefactor for his help.

On Tuesday, 16^th December, took place the inspection of final in this year renovation works in the Shed. Inspection was carried out by conservationist officers and the representatives of the City Council in Skierniewice. Company “Marbudex” once again proved its trustworthiness – the repairs above stands 4 to 6 were finished flawlessly and on time. In this way, we have finished the replacement of the outer cladding of the roof. The works were possible thanks to the support of the City Council in Skierniewice (50 000 PLN) and donations from 1% of income tax for 2013. Total cost of the latest works amounted over 55 000 PLN.

Nevertheless, there is still some work to be done – the rebuild of the roundhouse’s skylight still waits for its part. Currently, we are completing the building documentation regarding the future repairs. We also plan to finish the repairs of the workshop’s roof.

To sum up, the total cost of the roundhouse’s roof repairs reached 350 000 PLN.

On 9th December 2014 we took part in a symposium entitled “To save from rusting away. Conservation of Engineering Heritage – past and present”. Our colleague – Michał Jerczyński presented the paper “The need for national-wide conservation of railway constructions in regard of their historical significance and introducing the program for conservation of railway listed objects”. The symposium and the following panel discussion was organized by the Railway Museum in Warsaw, National Institute of Museums and Collections Conservation, Conservationist of the Mazovian Voivodeship, Department of Railway Transport, Polish State Railways and the Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw.

It is the end of yet another record breaking year of PARE operation, so it’s time for summing-up. First of all we would like to thank to all those, who decided to support us with their 1% of income tax for 2013 – a total amount of 33 000 PLN, which we multiplied as starting assets of grants for projects worth 175 000 PLN. A major part of this amount, 165 000 PLN, was devoted to the roof repairs – a total of 900 square meters of roundhouse roof cladding went through a general overhaul. The remaining 10 000 PLN was spent for the repairs of the points in Shed’s shunting tracks.

We also would like to express our gratitude to the sponsors of the rolling stock conservation works – in 2014 Freightliner PL has sponsored the relocation of the engine Ok1-266. PKP Cargo supported renovation works of the engine Ol49-4 and the beer refrigerator car. Tramwaje Warszawskie has been sponsor and contractor of reconstruction battery locomotive from 1928.

On behalf of the members and volunteers of PARE we would like to thank to all the sponsors.

PARE Sponsors in 2014

Roof repairs supported by:

Points and track repairs supported by:

Rolling stock renovation supported by: