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2-6-0

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Railway transport

   SRC 89 working on the daily passenger train in 1993.
   Enlarge
   SRC 89 working on the daily passenger train in 1993.

   In the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by
   wheel arrangement, a 2-6-0 has a pair of leading wheels followed by six
   driving wheels. This arrangement is commonly called a Mogul. This type
   of locomotive was built from the early 1860s to the 1920s.

   The equivalent UIC classification is 1'C.

History

   Although locomotives of this wheel arrangement were built as early as
   1852, these first examples had their leading axles mounted directly and
   rigidly on the frame of the locomotive rather than on a separate truck
   or bogie. In these early 2-6-0s, the leading axle was merely used to
   distribute the weight of the locomotive over a larger number of wheels.
   It did not serve the same purpose as the leading trucks of the
   Americans or Ten-Wheelers that had been in use for at least a decade.

   The first 2-6-0 with a rigidly mounted leading axle was the Pawnee,
   built for heavy freight service on the Philadelphia & Reading. In
   total, about 30 locomotives of this type were built for various
   railroads. While they were generally successful in slow, heavy freight
   service, the railroads that used them didn't see any great advantages
   in them over the 0-6-0 or 0-8-0 designs of the time. Essentially, this
   design was an 0-8-0 with the lead axle unpowered.

   The first true 2-6-0 wasn't built until the early 1860s, the first few
   being built in 1860 for the Louisville & Nashville railroad. The design
   that we know today required the invention of a single-axle swivelling
   truck. Such a truck was first patented by Levi Bissell in 1858. The New
   Jersey Locomotive and Machine Company built their first 2-6-0 in 1861
   as the Passaic for the Central Railroad of New Jersey. The Erie
   Railroad followed in 1862 with the first large order of this locomotive
   type. In 1863, Rogers built what some cite as the first 2-6-0 built in
   the United States for the New Jersey Railroad and Transportation
   Company.
   Boston and Maine Railroad 2-6-0 1366 on train 136 at Wyoming (Melrose,
   MA). September 18, 1947.
   Enlarge
   Boston and Maine Railroad 2-6-0 1366 on train 136 at Wyoming ( Melrose,
   MA). September 18, 1947.

   The railroads that used these first 2-6-0 examples noted their
   increased pulling power, but also found that their rather rigid
   suspension made them more prone to derailments than the 4-4-0s of the
   day. Many railroad mechanics attributed their derailments to having too
   little weight on the leading truck. In 1864, William S. Hudson, then
   the superintendent of Rogers, patented an equalized leading truck that
   was able to move independently of the driving axles. This equalized
   suspension worked much better over the uneven tracks of the day. The
   first locomotive built with such a leading truck was likely completed
   in 1865 for the New Jersey Railroad and Transportation Company as their
   number 39.

   It is likely that the locomotive class name Mogul derives from a
   locomotive built by Taunton in 1866 for the Central Railroad of New
   Jersey; that locomotive was named Mogul. However it has also been
   suggested that, in England, it derived from the engine of that name,
   built in 1879 by Neilson and Company for the Great Eastern Railway.
   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2-6-0"
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