V. V. Kuibyshev Kolomna Diesel Locomotive Plant

one of the oldest and largest Soviet transportation machine building enterprises. The plant was founded in 1863 near the town of Kolomna. In the second half of the 19th century it produced steam locomotives, railway cars, river boats, mobile steam engines, and bucket dredges.

From 1866 the plant was called the Struve Brothers Engineers Plant. In 1871 it became a joint-stock company of the Kolomna Machine-building Plant. The plant workers took an active part in the revolutionary movement. The first strike at the plant was called in 1886. In 1903 the plant’s underground organization of the RSDLP (Bolshevik) was established. A soviet of workers’ deputies was formed in Kolomna in October 1905. D. A. Zaitsev, a worker at the plant, was elected chairman. He was executed by a punitive expedition of tsarist troops in December 1905. Between 1906 and 1917 there were many strikes at the plant.

During the first years of Soviet power a small number of steam locomotives, railway cars, streetcars, and diesels were produced at the plant. Tractor production was organized in 1923, the plant produced the first steam locomotive of the S^u series in 1925, and the first diesel locomotives were produced in 1930. In 1932 the Kolomna plant joined the Dinamo Plant in producing VL (Vladimir Lenin) electric locomotives.

The plant was named after V. V. Kuibyshev in 1935. Before the Great Patriotic War (1941–45) the plant produced steam, diesel, and electric locomotives, diesel engines, heading shields and tubing for the subway, turbines, and condenser tenders for steam locomotives. During the war the plant met the needs of the front by repairing tanks, building armored trains, and manufacturing ammunition. In 1943 it resumed production of steam locomotives and diesels.

In November 1953 the V. V. Kuibyshev Diesel Locomotive Plant produced its 10,000th steam locomotive. In 1956 it discontinued the production of steam locomotives and concentrated on the production of diesel locomotives. The plant built a freight diesel locomotive with a capacity of 2,200 kW (3,000 hp) in 1958, and in 1959 it produced the Soviet Union’s first G1–01 freight gas turbine locomotive (2,570 kW, or 3,500 hp). In 1960 the TEP60 passenger express diesel locomotive was produced at the plant (2,200 kW; maximum speed, 160 km/hr). The plant has developed powerful diesels for rail transportation and other sectors of the national economy.

During the postwar period the V. V. Kuibyshev Kolomna Diesel Locomotive Plant has been expanded, reconstructed, and equipped with new machine-tool equipment. It has played a major role in developing the building of locomotives and diesels. The plant has been awarded the Order of Lenin (1939), the Order of the Red Banner of Labor (1945), and the Order of the October Revolution (1971).