China State Railways 2-10-2 Locomotives in China

Class Qianjin (Progress) or QJ (Locobase 2159)

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The QJ Santa Fes were built in by far the biggest numbers of any post-Revolution locomotive class. Compared to the Russian-supplied FDs, the QJs had a much higher superheat ratio in a boiler about the same size. See Hans Schaefer's extended description of the QJ at home.c2i.net/schaerfer/qjdetails/qjhistory.html (consulted in March 2002) in which he describes the boiler as a good feature of the design. Four arch tubes and a combustion chamber improve efficiency.

Production began in 1959 after some prototypes based on the Soviet LV class (Locobase 728) were tested and extensively modified in 1956. Annual production reached 325 locomotives in 1980 and ceased only in December 1988.

Schaefer comments: "The main trouble with the the engine is that it is in most parts a copy of an American 1930 engine, not state of the Art in the 1950s and 1960s". And he points out with the Chinese copying the Russian copy of the American engine, "things have not always improved." (Moreover, he notes elsewhere in this essay, the batches coming out of Datong in 1966-1976 (the years of the Cultural Revolution) were considered to have been of very low quality.)

Most troublesome is the poor counterbalancing and the undersized running gear. Bearings wear quickly and the engines use too much oil. Combined with an indifferent standard of maintenance and repair and one gets rough-running engines "hunting and bouncing along the line."

The list of demerits grows longer. The engine beats up its crews, who run the locomotive at less than full power and mean pressure to save parts. Sanding gear is too sparingly supplied, stokers either are broken or not installed at all, water pump and injector capacities are stingy and so on.