The rolling stock used on the Hejaz Railway was the single highest item of expenditure for the cash-strapped Ottoman Empire, struggling to meet its debts to its European competitors during the final decades of the nineteenth century. Sultan Abdulhamid II's original plan to use materials provided solely by Ottoman factories and foundries was quickly recognised as unrealistic, and instead the railway's Central Commission in Constantinople set up a system of procurement to purchase the required rolling stock from Europe, mainly from German suppliers. Locomotives and wagons were ordered to conform to the Hejaz Railway's narrow gauge track of 1.05 metres, the same dimensions as the D.H.P. (Damas, Hama et Prolongements) Beirut to Damascus line, on which the rolling stock was brought in prior to the completion of the Haifa to Dera'a branch line.