CP's 0181-0190 series steam engines

Built by Henchel & Sohn

The 0181-0190 series steam engines entered service with the State Railway Company between 1924 and 1925.

The 10 steam engines built by German manufacturer Henchel & Sohn for the Southern and South-Eastern Railway Network provided the Company with powerful locomotives suitable for freight and passenger services. They were delivered to Portugal by Germany as compensation for World War I.
Initially, the fleet was numbered CFS 401 to 410, but after the integration of the Southern and South-Eastern Railway into the Portuguese Railway Company in 1927, they were renumbered CPss 01201 to 01210. From the early 1950s onwards, they were renumbered again, becoming definitively the 0181-0190 series.

In the 1940s, the fleet underwent a major change at the Barreiro workshops, which allowed steam locomotives to burn fuel oil instead of coal. This was a practice that, at the time, was being implemented in the Company's main series of steam engines to respond to the scarcity and high cost of coal.

The career of these steam engines began in 1924 and continued until the late 1970s. They ran practically from north to south of the country. They were initially placed in the Barreiro depot and began commercial service, providing traction for mixed and freight trains between Barreiro and Funcheira via Beja, ore trains from the Aljustrel and Lousal mines, and fertiliser trains between the former CUF (Companhia União Fabril) in Barreiro and Entroncamento.
Later, this series of engines was also used to pull trains on the Beira Baixa, North, Minho, Leixões and Douro lines.

The programme to phase out steam traction and the acquisition of new diesel locomotives contributed to the decline of the 0181-0190 series. At the end of their careers, they still provided connections between Porto-São Bento and Viana do Castelo, and between Porto-São Bento and Régua. They were permanently taken out of service in 1977, the year steam traction on broad-gauge tracks was abolished in Portugal.

Between the 1990s and early 2000s, the CP 0186 and CP 0187 steam engines were restored with the aim of integrating them into historic trains or special services. Currently, the CP 0186 steam locomotive is operational and pulls the Douro Historical Train.