My stepfather used to tell how he hand bombed this type of engine on the hump with putting it in the corners every time, back when he was a kid in the 1920's.
Shoveling coal by hand, no stoker. Shoveling into the firebox corners. Can't be any fun on an engine that size (or any other for that matter). That one looks like a class NU-1, of which few people know the Central had. Thanks for posting it, oldblue.
Wow, what a monster. I never knew the Water Level Route owned articulateds, but I now find that they owned several classes including 0-6-6-0s, 2-6-6-2s and these 0-8-8-0s. Neat stuff!
I agree, that's an excellent example of a Mallet compound. The photo angle really shows the difference between the low and high pressure cylinders. I'd like to know why the low pressure cylinders used slide valves while the high pressure cylinders used piston valves. Probably some obscure design issue regarding super-heated high pressure dry steam versus lower temperature low pressure wet steam....?
It's my understanding that slide valves continued to be used with saturated steam for many years in spite of the more complex casting and machining involved. I have no idea why as this would seem to be an unneeded expense. Can anyone shed light on this?
Tom, the locomotive manufacturers eventually agreed that slide valves were an unnecessary expense. The N&W Y-6a also was a compound Mallet, but had piston valves on its low pressure steam chests. Although they were significantly larger than the valves on the high pressure steam chests. Jim (Fitz) posted this photo of the Y6a on the Steam Locomotive Valve Gear thread.
