2-8-2 Steam Locomotives in India

Class IRS/XE (Locobase 4274)

Data from [] (first accessed 17 June 2003, most recently accessed at [], 24 August 2017); and "Standard Goods Engine and Tender for the Buenos Ayres [sic] Great Southernl Railway", Vulcan Foundry Locomotive Catalogue, No. 51, found on Flicker's Historical Locomotive Images website at []. See also the Indian Railways Fan Club website at[], last accessed 8 August 2021. (Many thanks to Jorge Cerezo Toledo for his 26 June 2021 email containing links to several sites including the Vulcan Catalogue referred to above.) Vulcan works numbers were 4146-4157 in 1928.

Part of a series of designs created in the mid-1920s to meet Indian railway requirements. At the time they were the heaviest locomotives to have been produced by the Vulcan Foundry. A look at the specs for the Belpaire firebox (area and grate area; alone as well as the 22.5 long ton axle loading indicate the considerable size. In part, IRFCA commented, this was due to the need for"...a wider firebox and other improvements to handle low-grade coal." Firebox heating surface included 26 sq ft of arch tubes (2.7 sq m).

IRFCA also stated that XE stood for "X Eagle".

S. Shankar of India's National Railway Museum -- [] -- wrote of the XE: The XE is the heaviest non-articulated steam locomotive ever used on the IR. They used to weigh a good 200 tonnes in working order. The massive XEs were used all over the IR network in their heyday, hauling as much as 2,000 ton mineral trains. Sundar noted that Indian firemen, like their compatriots around the world, found hand-bombing such a big grate was a chore and that mechanical stokers later relieved the strain.

In their final days (into the 1980s), however, they could be spotted by and large on the ER (Andal, Asansol, Jhajha), WR (Kota) and the SR. (Erode, Jolarpettai)."

According to a brochure released by Vulcan Foundry at the time, the 1945 batch of 35 engines differed in having revised cylinders and steam chests "giving improved valve events", rod big ends turning on Skefko roller bearings and a Cole pattern rear truck.

A total of five XEs were preserved in operating condition.

Class IRS/YD (Locobase 4275)

Data from [], a reprint of the Vulcan magazine for Winter 1949, which describes Vulcan's delivery of 44 of these Mikados.

They were part of a series of designs created in the mid-1920s to meet Indian railway requirements. This is the metere-gauge goods locomotive. 24 went to Mysore (10) and Nizam's State (14) with 20 more in use in Burma.

[] notes that these had "...a wider firebox and other improvements to handle low-grade coal."