But passenger locomotives were considered unnecessary, because at that time the maximum speed of trains on the Tampere and Vaasa railway line was only 26.7 kilometres per hour (16.6 mph).

C5 locomotives soon proved to be insufficiently powerful for the gradients of the Tampere and Vaasa railway line.

C5 locomotives were moved to the flatter Seinäjoki–Oulu line, where they performed satisfactorily.

By the 1900s the C5 locomotives were transferred to shunting duties in the marshalling yards of various towns and cities around Finland.

Today the Finnish Railway Museum has a class C5 on display.