Paris-Lyon-Mediterrannee 0-6-2 Locomotives in France

Class 3001 / 031 A 1 (Locobase 7597)

Data from a site that reproduces cigarette card pictures and adds dimension and area data -- [], last accessed 14 June 2006, the US Military Railway Service Equipment Data Book for French Locomotives supplied by Allen Stanley in March 2004 from his extensive Rail Data Exchange, and

"Locomotives of the C de FPLM," The Locomotive Magazine, Vol V (January 1900), p.5.

Construction was shared by Floridsdorf of Vienna (3 001-3 060) and Wiener-Neustadt (3 061-3 140) in 1881-1882.

In the accompanying photograph, Locobase sees a Belpaire firebox (nothing too unusual), a tall dome over the second driven axle and behind a "saddle-bag" sandbox, fat cylinders mounted low, but most unusually a separate tender on this wheel arrangement. The notes say that these were used for passenger and freight service. They were designed by Henry.

Derived from both the Borbonnaise type of 6-coupled freight and the Series 111 2-4-2 (Locobase 1102), this class of radial tanks built in Austria-Hungary had the additional feature of being able to haul freight at 35 km/h (23 mph) (which conveys just how slow slow freight could be in France).

The trailing truck was adapted from that which supported the firebox in the express engines. Locobase also assumes that the firebox is identical to that of the 111s and the locomotives derived their power from outside cylinders supplied by inside valve gear. The 2nd and 3rd coupled axles were equalized.

The French locomotive website [], accessed 26 October 2006, says 54 of of the 136 that still served the Sud-Est were taken into the SNCF in 1938. The last of these retired in 1950.