Diesel locomotive Therefore, diesel traction became economical for shunting before it became economical for hauling trains. The construction of diesel shunters began in 1920 in France, in 1925 in Denmark, in 1926 in the Netherlands, and in 1927 in Germany. After few years of testing, hundreds of units were produced within a decade. Diesel-powered or "oil-engined" railcars, generally diesel–mechanical, were developed by various European manufacturers in the 1930s, e.g. by William Beardmore and Company for the Canadian National Railways (the Beardmore Tornado engine was subsequently used in the R101 airship). Some of those series for regional traffic were begun with gasoline motors
Diesel locomotive as EMD's main competitor in the early 1960s, eventually taking the top position in the locomotive market from EMD. Early diesel–electric locomotives in the United States used direct current (DC) traction motors, but alternating current (AC) motors came into widespread use in the 1990s, starting with the Electro-Motive SD70MAC in 1993 and followed by the General Electric's AC4400CW in 1994 and AC6000CW in 1995. In 1914, world's first functional diesel–electric railcars were produced for the "Königlich-Sächsische Staatseisenbahnen" (Royal Saxon State Railways) by Waggonfabrik Rastatt with electric equipment from Brown, Boveri & Cie and diesel engines from Swiss Sulzer AG. They