The British Railways Standard Class 4 4-6-0 is a class of steam locomotives, 80 of which were built during the 1950s. Six have been preserved.

Background

The class was introduced in 1951. They were designed for mixed traffic use on secondary routes where the otherwise ubiquitous

BR Standard Class 5 The British Railways Standard Class 5MT is one of the 12 Steam locomotives of British Railways#BR Standard Classes, standard classes of steam locomotive built by British Railways in the 1950s. It was essentially a development of the LMS Stanier ...

and their predecessors, the Black Fives, would be too heavy. They were essentially a tender version of the standard 4 2-6-4T, with similar characteristics to the

GWR Manor Class The Great Western Railway (GWR) 7800 Class or Manor Class is a class of 4-6-0 steam locomotive. They were designed as a lighter version of the Grange Class, giving them a wider Route Availability. Like the 'Granges', the 'Manors' used parts fro ...

, though unlike the Manors they were built to the universal loading gauge. They used the same running gear as the tank engine (with the leading bogie from the Standard Class 5), and substantially the same firebox, smokebox and boiler, although the boiler barrel was increased in length by . Design work was done at Brighton by R. A. Riddles, with help from Swindon, Derby and Doncaster. Construction was at the BR

Swindon Works Swindon railway works was opened by the Great Western Railway in 1843 in Swindon, Wiltshire, England. It served as the principal west England maintenance centre until closed in 1986. History In 1835 Parliament approved the construction of the ...

. The engine weighed , was long, with diameter driving wheels. It had two cylinders of diameter and stroke operated at maximum boiler pressure of , to produce tractive effort. Its British Railways power classification was 4MT. It normally used the standard BR2 or BR2A tender, which weighed and carried of water and of coal. In this configuration its route availability was 4, almost universal over the British Railways network.

In service

The class was initially allocated to the

London Midland Region The London Midland Region (LMR) was one of the six regions created on the formation of the nationalised British Railways (BR), and initially consisted of ex-London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) lines in England, Wales and Northern Irelan ...

(45) and the Western Region (20). The last 15 were allocated to the Southern Region. The Southern batch were built with BR1B tenders, which weighed , and carried of water and of coal. This reduced their route availability to 7, the same as the Standard Class 5.

Preservation

Six members of the class survive with both single chimney and double chimney examples. Two were purchased directly from BR (75027 & 75029); the remaining four were rescued from

Woodham Brothers Woodham Brothers Ltd is a trading business, based mainly around activities and premises located within Barry Docks, in Barry, South Wales. It is noted globally for its 1960s activity as a scrapyard (hence its colloquial name of Barry Scrapyard), ...

' scrapyard at

Barry Island Barry Island ( cy, Ynys y Barri) is a district, peninsula and seaside resort, forming part of the town of Barry in the Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales. It is named after the 6th century Saint Baruc. Barry's stretch of coast, on the Bristol Chan ...

. No member of the class is presently main line approved but three (75014, 75029 and 75069) have worked on the main line at various points in preservation. 75029 was passed to work on the main line between Grosmont and

Whitby Whitby is a seaside town, port and civil parish in the Scarborough borough of North Yorkshire, England. Situated on the east coast of Yorkshire at the mouth of the River Esk, Whitby has a maritime, mineral and tourist heritage. Its East Clif ...

with occasional visits to Battersby during galas. All except for 75079 have operated in preservation.

Model railways

Bachmann Bachmann is a surname of Switzerland and Germany. It originates as a description of the bearer as dwelling near a brook (''Bach''), such as a farm "Hofstatt am Bach" also called "Bachmanns Hofstatt" near Hinwil or Dürnten (recorded 1387), or the ...

and Hornby have both recently released models of these engines in 00 gauge. Mainline Railways also released a OO gauge model of the Standard Class 4MT 4-6-0 in the 1970s, although this is no longer in production. In 1983, Mainline's model was reintroduced to their catalogue as locomotive 75033 in BR lined black.

References

* ''A Detailed History of BR Standard Steam Locomotives'', - Vol 2 - The 4-6-0 and 2-6-0 Classes. RCTS *

External links

Southern E-group photo gallery

75079 webpage at the Mid Hants Railway
{{Authority control 4 4-6-0 4-6-0 locomotives Railway locomotives introduced in 1951 Mixed traffic locomotives