Entering service in 1965, the Class 40 also operated on private railroads after the repeal of CFRs monopoly on rail transport.

Since the start of dieselisation in Romania and the electrification of the first railway sector between Bucharest and Brașov, communist ambitions were to improve local industrial capacities, remove dependency on outside sources and reduce conventional fuel consumption.

[1] Since Romania did not develop an electrical locomotive to suit these ambitions, foreign partnerships were searched to design and home build a working horse for the Romanian Railways.

In 1974, 060-EA1-122 (later 41-0122-6) was built using experimental 200 km/h axles and gear ratios and used as a test locomotive under the classification of EA2 (thus becoming 060-EA2-122, nicknamed "The General" due to this high ranking status).

302 soon became the new "general", breaking the speed records for Romanian Railways twice, once in 1997 during testing of the Eurofima-based passenger cars on the Florești Prahova-Buda stretch of the Ploiești-Brașov mainline, and the second time in 2007 on the Făurei ring during testing for Astra Arad passenger cars.

They were later rebuilt by Softronic Craiova, and up to this date only 1 unrefurbished locomotive (45-0318-1) runs in regular service, seen mostly on Bucharest-Constanța mainline.

Refurbishments are done by SCRL Brașov, RELOC, INDA and Softronic Craiova, REMAR Pașcani and Cluj and PROMAT.

A number of examples are operated by Magyar Magánvasút Zrt., Train Hungary, Prvá Slovenská železničná, Foxrail and Floyd Zrt, and are used in regular service in those countries.

A final attempt was to use them as testbeds for an experimental traction system, but this also didn't occur and the two units were scrapped in the early 1990s.

Certain modernizations (such as by PROMAT but in lower numbers) maintain the "wheel" but have a renovated dashboard, somewhat similar to the CFR Class 46.

For Yugoslavia, the train brake was also manufactured by Oerlikon, not to mention the fact that the cab is placed on the left instead of the right side, as at the time the Yugoslavian Railways ordered its electric locomotives with the driving position on the right.

Eventually this "tradition" died out when multiple locomotives were refurbished or scrapped, but some train drivers continued it in the 2000s and 2010s, including on modernized Class 47s.