Paris-Orleans 0-6-0 Locomotives in France

Class 1031 (Locobase 11284)

Data from diagram UG Type 71, Societe Alsacienne de Constructions Mecaniques from locomotive book supplied by Dany Machi up at [] as

Diagrammes des machines SACM construites a GRAFENSTADEN (October 2007). See also Data from Maurice Demoulin, Traite Pratique de la Machine Locomotive (Paris: Libraire Polytechnique, Baudry et Cie, 1898), pp.154-155.

This set of locomotive-tenderes de gare were essentially duplicates of the Est locomotives shown in Locobase 11283. The Grafenstaden diagram show an enormous steam stupa (domes didn't usually look so much like a Buddhist temple) over the first axle; its shape was mirrored by the smaller safety-valve stand on the firebox. The upturned bucket shape of the large sand dome stood over the second axle.

Locobase's identification of the class is tentative because Demoulin described a locomotive with a smaller grate, but his Figure 71 on page 155 is essentially identical to the diagram in the SACM book.

Class 1566 (Locobase 11266)

Data Maurice Demoulin, Traite Pratique de la Machine Locomotive (Paris: Libraire Polytechnique, Baudry et Cie, 1898), p.117-118

These were relatively high-drivered mixed-traffic 6-coupleds. Later batches were virtually identical, but had smaller drivers; see Locobase 11267.

Class 1586 (Locobase 11267)

Data Maurice Demoulin, Traite Pratique de la Machine Locomotive (Paris: Libraire Polytechnique, Baudry et Cie, 1898), p.117-118

This class adopted many of the features of the 1566 class (Locobase 11266), but used smaller drivers and a slightly smaller grate.

Class 2.168 (Locobase 11279)

Data Maurice Demoulin, Traite Pratique de la Machine Locomotive (Paris: Libraire Polytechnique, Baudry et Cie, 1898), p.147-149; and James Dredge (ed.), "Section V Historical Locomotives and Rolling Stock -- 61 -- The Exhibit of the Paris and Orleans Railway Company'", in A Record of the Transportation Exhibits at the World's Columbian Exposition (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1894), pp. 242-243. See also the Proceedings of the Fifth Session of the International Railway Congress (London, June-July 1895), Volume IV Appendix to the List of Questions for Discussion - Form E (Brussels: Weissenbruch, 1897), pp. 158 et seq, for a detailed description of the Ten-Brinck firebox. (Thanks to Alexander Blessing for his 25 December 2019 email reporting the firebox and grate areas.)

In 1892, the P-O realized that the four-coupleds they were then using for suburban service simply didn't match the need. And the addition of the Sceaux line toward Luxembourg, much of which was underground, sparked the production a new type. This was an all-adhesion locomotive designed to pull 220-tonne trains up a 2% grade of some 4.5-km in length at 50 kph (31 mph) and around 250-m radius curves. Indeed, the class proved quite capable of scaling a slight ( 1/4%) grade with anywhere from 510 tonnes (55 km/h//34 mph) to 780 tonnes (30 km/h//18.6 mph). Faced with a 3% ruling grade, the engines could manage 110 tons at 45 km/h (30 mph).

A photograph shows a remarkable 3-dome system of steam collection (1 dome over each axle) in which the center drum is connected to each of the other, round-topped domes by a steam pipe. Both the cylinders and the valves were placed inside between the frames. The front axle enjoyed a play of 10 mm to each side.

Locobase isn't sure, but knowing that the locomotives had an exhaust-condensing system to prevent asphyxiation of the passengers, suspects that the front dome accepted the exhaust and recirculated it through the external pipe for reuse in the large side tanks. (The bunkers seem quite small, but the distances covered by this service were not great.)

As with many P-O engines, this class was fitted with the Ten-Brinck firebox between the rear two axles.

The Ten-Brinck had fixed grate raked at 40 degrees down from the hopper in the firedoor and a prominent water-tube "bridge" arch that paralleled that rake over the fire; another smaller fixed grate lay under the bridge. One description of the design emphasizes their ability to burn coal cleanly: "The Ten Brinck furnaces are really gas producers, for the gas coming from the distillation of the coal on the top of the fixed grate is burnt on the return of the flame by the influx of air directed into it by the valve over the hopper, to mix it with the gas coming from the combustion of the coal on the lower part of the fixed grate."

In addition, says the author, "To get the most complete smoke consumption possible with this sort of furnace, it is necessary while running, to keep the two grates completely covered by fuel and the air valve more or less open according to the intensity of the combustion, so as to burn, with a slight excess of air, the gas distilled from the coal."

Class 32 (Locobase 7378)

Data from Titre Exposition universelle internationale de 1878 a Paris. Rapports du jury internationale..Volume Groupe VI - Classe 64. Rapport sur le materiel des chemins de fer. p. 50 (cnum.cnam.fr/CGI/fpage.cgi?8XAE277-11.1/54/100/312/0/0 (accessed 1 September 2005) table and page 91. Works numbers were 1935-1940 in 1877.

This locomotive's service area is listed as "Gare", meaning it was a terminal switcher that moved rolling stock around the rail yard. The engine had a small grate and firebox for its boiler. Locobase wonders if the thinking was to heat the large boiler, then depend maintain its steam with the equivalent of a sterno can under the hot water ....

Class 792 (Locobase 7576)

Data from a French locomotive reference site -- [] -- last accessed 6 November 2006. See also Maurice Demoulin, Traite Pratique de la Machine Locomotive (Paris: Libraire Polytechnique, Baudry et Cie, 1898), p.116/

These were bigger in all respects than the Polonceau 720s shown in Locobase 601. Originally produced by Koechlin, the class would add batches for years. Those produced in 1863 and 1865, says Demoulin, had the 450-mm cylinders shown in the specs; later engines adopted 480-mm cylinders. Heating surface area varied with those produced in 1867-1888 using boilers incorporating 147 sq m and a grate area of 1.42 sq m. Tube counts varied from 206 to 214 and their lengths from 4.25 m to 4.39 m.

This entry notes that the class was rebuilt in 1893-1901 with a 2-dome boiler. Grate grew slightly to 1.61 sq m and overall heating surface area increased to 158.22 sq m.

The photograph shows the locomotive using outside Stephenson link valve gear mounted on the middle axle. Also noticeable are the two domes, one partly embraced by the cab and the other over the first axle.

Class Mammouth (Locobase 11340)

Data from Alexandre Louis Deghilage, Origine de la Locomotive (Paris: Imprierie A Broise et Courtier, 1886), p.42.

This locomotive is described by Deghilage as qualifying for the term "type a long chaudiere" (longboiler). The principal differences between Mammouths and the slightly later Bourbonnais type was the interior cylinders of the former vs the exterior cylinders of the latter. Although placing the cylinders closer to the centerline may have cut down on an all-adhesion engine's desire to "hunt", it also limited cylinder size.

Still, the Mammouths were widely dispersed when all was said and done, with over 600 going into service and, 40 years later, noted by Deghilage as receiving new boilers and being capable of pulling mixed-traffic trains at 50 km/h.

Class Polonceau (Locobase 600)

Reder (1974) for data, corrected by August Perdonnet, Traite Elementaire des Chemins de Fer, Tome Second (Paris: Garnier Freres, , 1860), pp. 583-586.

Polonceau followed up his initial success with outside frame, inside-cylinder locomotives by creating the definitive Paris-Orleans 0-6-0 freight locomotive. In place of several sub-frames, he had a continuous outside plate and a single inside frame member on the centerline. In this first batch of 62 engines, the firebox was located between the driving axles, which yielded a deceptively modern ratio between the firebox and boiler heating surface areas. The next batch (see Locobase 601 entry for 720-791), had an overhanging firebox of similar size, but a 46% larger boiler. The 658-719 group was modified to a like design in 1861-1864 and served with them for decades.

Class Polonceau (Locobase 601)

See ; Data confirmed and supplemented from Titre Rapports du jury mixte internationale publies sous la dir. de S.A.I le Prince Napoleon, presidente de la commission Imperial (Paris, Impremerie Imperiale, 1856) Collation [4]-LXXVI-1574-p. -[2]; Cote CNAM 8th Xae 53 - Mots mateiere Exposition internationale (1885; Paris); Industrie - 19e siecle; Produits industriels - 19e siecle, p. 233, hosted on cnum.cnam.fr/CGI/fpage.cgi?8XAE53/320/100/1664/0/0, accessed 1 September 2005.

Reder tells us Polonceau modified his 1854 freight engine design (see Locobase 600 for 658-719) by moving the firebox behind the rear axle. This move yielded a slightly larger firebox and a much larger boiler. 62 engines (720-791) were built, being joined by the earlier 62 examples modified to the later design in 1861-1864. All 134 engines remained in service for decades. 30 were still running in 1930 and the last was scrapped in 1939.

(35 engines --541-575-- were ordered by the Ouest Railroad in 1857. These were similar, save for a 61 1/2-in driving wheel diameter.)

Class unknown (Locobase 13210)

Data from W H Maw and William Dredge, "Locomotives", Reports on the Vienna Universal Exhibition, Part II (London: George Eyre and William Spottiswoode, 1874), p. 404. See also Robert H Thurston, AMCE, Report on Machinery and Manufacturers, Part I, Reports of the Commissioners of the United States to the International Exhibition in Vienna, Volume III [3] (Washington, DC: Government Printing Officer, 1875), p. 62.

Maw and Dredge report that this Vienna exhibit was one of a production run for the P-O. Although they describe the locomotive as having "...no special peculiarities requiring notice here", the authors note two features. The boiler tubes were steadied by a guide plate located halfway along their length, ".. a plan which used at one time to be resorted to in this country [England], but which has long been abandoned here."

The other highlight gains more approval. The drawbar at the back of the engine was coupled to a beam that in turn was connected by side rods or links to a another beam located between the second and third driving axles. This beam oscillated on a center which was braced by transverse stays. "The pull is thus transmitted to a point well forward, and the engine is left more free to adjust itself to the road than is the case when the drawbar is

coupled to the frame direct [sic] at the trailing end."

The authors also disapprove of the styling of this typically French locomotive, saying that the cab is "decidedly ugly", the general look not improved by brass lagging plates on the boiler, dome, and sand-box, and "the working parts ...left just as they came from machine tools."

Robert Thurston, writing for the Commissioners' report, succinctly dismissed the engine: "Many of the details of this engine seem badly proportioned and awkwardly arranged."

NB: Heating surface areas in this entry represent water-side tube diameters. Maw and Dredge present both. Inside diameter of the boiler tubes was 1.75 in (44.5 mm), which yielded a tube heating surface area of 1,413.3 sq ft (131.35 sq m). Tube length is between the tube plates.

Class unknown (Locobase 15601)

Data from diagram No 34, Societe Alsacienne de Constructions Mecaniques from locomotive book supplied by Dany Machi up at [] as

Diagrammes des machines SACM construites a GRAFENSTADEN (October 2007).

The look and dimensions of this six-coupled freight locomotive suggest a 19th century engine. In addition to the low boiler pressure setting, the long low boiler had a tall steam dome over the gap between the first and second axle, an upended-bucket shaped sand dome over the first axle, and a capped stack with bands.