Great Northern 0-6-2 Locomotives in Great_Britain

Class N1 (Locobase 2314)

Inside-cylinder tank engine designed by HA Ivatt. See Ahrons (1927) for data with additional data and information from Richard Marsden's LNER encyclopedia ([], accessed 19 March 2005). Doncaster works numbers were 1145 (1906), 1176-1185 (1907), and 1256-1265 (1910).

Marsden explains that the first N1s bore too heavily on the West Metropolitan lines and were exiled to West Riding. The trailing radial axle was moved farther back as was the center of weight of the bunkers. This seems to have done the trick and 6 batches in all were delivered, most by 1912.

Eleven were fitted with superheaters; see Locobase 6468.

OS Nock (RWC IV, pl 157) has a watercolor illustration of one engine sheathed in armor. The armored locomotive never actually went into service.

West Riding N1s persisted in passenger service through the 1930s. The N1s used around London found a niche by the mid-1920s that explains their survival despite their relatively antiquated slide-valve, mostly saturated-steam design. Driven from passenger working, they took up switching duties and empty coal trains. The first of the class was retired only in 1947, while most of the rest lasted until the 1950s with last going in 1959.

Class N1 - superheated (Locobase 6468)

See Richard Marsden's LNER encyclopedia ([], accessed 19 March 2005).

Although the first two Ivatt-designed inside-cylinder tanks (Locobase 2314) to be converted were fitted with Schmidt type superheaters, the other 9 received Robinson-design equipment and the LNER retrofitted Robinson superheaters into the first two.

Richard HN Hardy took hundreds of photographs of LNER equipment and people during his decades of service to that Grouped system and the BR. He later wrote extensive captions that took care to include the good and bad points of several locomotive classes. See [], a website offerings and other photographs for sale and visited 8 May 2006.

Hardy's comment on 4584, a superheated N1 then recently transferred (ca 1943) to the West Riding: "She was very rough," adding further on about the class that they were "...marvellous engines and always got away up the bank [the 2 1/2% Batley Hole]. On a Sunday, they took five Buckeyes up from Batley on the London expresses without assistance." Locobase believes "Buckeyes" refers to carriages fitted with the Buckeye anti-telescoping coupler.

Class N2 (Locobase 2355)

Data from "Recent British Locomotives for Home and Foreign Service", Railway Engineer, Volume 42, No 5 (May 1921), pp. 175-176; Ahrons (1927); see also Richard Marsden, "The Gresley N2 0-6-2T Locomotives" on the LNER Encyclopedia website at [], last accessed 27 February 2021. See also [], accessed 8 May 2006; later link [], last accessed 27 February 2021)Bryan Attewell's Steam locomotive simulator (April 2000 edition) ([] a length between tubeplates of 10.33 ft. (Thanks to Alexander Blessing for his 4 January 2025 noting the valve gear difference between these engines and the Great Eastern engines mentioned just below.) In addition to Doncaster's output, engines came from

North British locomotive Co (works numbers 22577-22626 in 1920)

Beyer, Peacock & Co (works numbers 6210-6221 in 1925)

Yorkshire Engine Co (works numbers 2220-2228 in 1928-1929)

Hawthorn, Leslie & Co (works numbers 3690-3710 in 1928)

Nigel Gresley design of 1920 invites an interesting comparison with the inside-cylinder design by AJ Hill for the Great Eastern in 1914 (2354). Doncaster built 57 (10 in 1920, 47 in 1925-1929) and North British delivered 50 in 1921. They were a condensing tank engine that recirculated their exhaust when operating in tunnels.

RE commented that locomotives "of this class" were "admirably suited for the needs of heavy and frequently stopping suburban passenger traffic" even as they were also able to achieve relatively high average speeds between stops. RE's report said that these engines would be capable of "a good deal of heavy pulling" outbound on the High Barnet line as well as in the underground section between Moorgate Street and King's Cross Station and beyond to the King's Cross Metropolitan and King's Cross Suburban. Considering the apparently small boiler available to feed the cylinders, RE may have concluded that Gresley's relatively unusual adoption (for British locomotives) of high superheat ratios may offset the low ratio.

The design was quite successful and served until 1959-1962.

The Great Central site -- [] (visited November 2002) -- describes a smaller boiler with the tube heating surface as 819 sq ft (76.09 sq m) compared to 880 (81.75 sq m) in Ahrons' specs and the superheater area as 192 sq ft (17.84 sq m). Richard Marsden explained that these data depict an N2 with the 18-element Robinson superheater.

Richard Drew of the GCR site observes: "The N2s worked hard for their living, having to overcome the 1 in 60 [1.67 %] gradients of the High Barnet branch from Finsbury Park up to Park junction at Highgate and the even worse start from Platform 14 at King's Cross at 1 in 49 [slightly more than 2 %] coming up from the "Widened Lines"." The commentator adds that N2s usually pulled 2 "Quadart" sets, coaches that were "possibly some of the most uncomfortable stock ever provided for suburban passengers."

The N2s would work these, not only to High Barnet but "to Hitchin and Baldock, and to Hertford North". In addition, they worked the empty stock between King's Cross and the carriage sidings at Bounds Green.

Richard HN Hardy (see Locobase 2314 for a discussion of this photographer and his extensive collection of LNER image mentions the N2 in several captions. In RHN 30, he credits this design (and Gresley's J6 0-6-0 and D1 4-4-0s) as "incredibly light on water and coal". In the West Riding, however, they were "too shy of steam ...unless the fire was very thin indeed." A later caption - RHN 60 - is harsher. They were still "quick on the uptake and strong, but would not steam freely without some unauthorized addtions across the blastpipe. There were no tears shed," he concludes, "when the unwanted and top-heavy N2s went away to be foisted on some other shed."