North Eastern 2-4-0 Locomotives in Great_Britain

Class 1440 Class (Locobase 7477)

Data from Richard Marsden's online LNER Encyclopedia ([], accessed 4 March 2006).

Marsden reports that the NER recognized the need for more powerful locomotives to pull the Leeds-West Hartlepool trains that ran through Ripon and Stockton. So Fletcher, already delivered of the successful 901s, designed this group with few differences other than the smaller drivers. Over time, larger locomotives in turn moved these to secondary service.

Retirements began in 1919, but the LNER still took in 9 of the 15 in 1923, but only to continue withdrawing them until the last was gone in February 1925.

Class 1440/G1/G - Waterbury (Locobase 8446)

Data from [], accessed 28 May 2007.

This T W Worsdell class was nicknamed "Waterbury" because it kept time like a good railroad watch on its mixed-traffic service. The 20 engines were delivered in 1887-1888.

They were rebuilt as 4-4-0s in 1900-1904 by Thomas's brother Wilson at which time they gave up the Joy valve gear and slide valves for Stephenson link and piston valves while increasing cylinder volume to 18".

In that configuration they were superheated in 1913; see Locobase 7478.

Class 544 Class (Locobase 20354)

Data from "Some Fragmentary Notes on NE Ry Engines, Old and New", The Locomotive, Volume XX [20] (15 June 1914), p. 149. Works numbers were 1306-1315 in 1865.

Edward Fletcher-designed express passenger six-wheelers with fireboxes particularly designed to burn coke. As delivered, they had heavy riveted outside frames with small curves over the drivers' cranks, a big brass dome over the gap between the lead truck and the lead driving axle. Later on, cylinder diameter increased to 17" (432 mm). The openwork framework over the drivers was later closed in.

The LM report said that "These engines were carefully designed, well constructed, and in their day constituted very favourable examples of locomotive engineering. They did good work for nearly 40 years."

Class 901 Class (Locobase 670)

Data from "The '901 Class,' NER", The Locomotive, Vol XVI (24 February 1910), pp. 32-33.

55 of these engines were built for the North Eastern from 1872-1882, 35 at the Gateshead works, 10 by Beyer, Peacock & Co, and 10 by Neilson.

Steam ports were 13" x 1 1/2", exhaust ports 3 1/2" in diameter. Valve travel in full gear measured 4 9/16" with an outside lap of 1 1/2", inside lap of 1/16, and 3/16" lead. (Ahrons, 1927). At the Newark brake trials in 1875, this engine achieved 57.25 mph with a train load (including engine and tender) of 203.6 tons. When pulling the heavier Great Northern rake of 262.3 tons, maximum speed dropped to 49.5 mph.

Double-frame featuring plates 1 1/4" thick with outside bearings on the leading axle that measured 12" long and 6" in diameter.. The straight belt line ran at axle level with a semi-circular splasher with 2 large slots over the front driver and a boxed-in rear driver.

Richard Fletcher's design resulted in a steady rider with good speed, capable of a 47.8-mph average from York to Newcastle, 47 mph between Newcastle and Berwick on the Scottish border, and 45 mph from Berwick to Edinburgh (1876 Flying Scotsman schedule).

These engines were later fitted with new boilers which used 205 1 3/4" tubes of 995 sq ft in aggregate area. They also received 18" cylinders.

Class S & D (Locobase 3514)

Data from W J Barker, "Some Fragmentary Notes on North Eastern Railway Engines, Old and New", Locomotive Magazine, Volume 18 (14 September 1912), p. 196.

These were the last of the Stockton & Darlington engines before the line's absorption into the North Eastern blurred the distinctions. It was, in a sense, a Jubilee engine as it appeared at the 50th anniversary of the founding of the line in 1875. Designed by John Kitching, it had a straight boiler, tall dome, slotted splasher over the forward driver, and underhung springs on all axles.

The last 8 2-4-0s had 17" x 24" cylinder and 78" drivers.

Ahrons (1927)

Class Tennant / E5 (Locobase 2227)

Data from E L Ahrons, The British Railway Locomotive, 1825-1925 (London: Locomotive Publishing Company, 1926); John S Maclean, The Locomotives of the North Eastern Railway-1841-1922 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: R Robinson & Company, 1922?), pp. 68-70; and Richard Marsden's online LNER Encyclopedia ([], accessed 4 March 2006) and Mr Edward Woods, Address to the Institution of Civil Engineers 9 November 1886 (London: ICE, 1886), p. 60 for data.

Developed by TW Worsdell, though not officially credited to him, these were an emergency solution to the problem of under-performance by the line's new Class 38/1492 4-4-0s (Locobase 2232).

Boiler later pressed to 160 psi, which yielded a tractive effort of 12,400 lb. "They may be described," wrote Ahrons," as a modernised Fletcher type, and the motion and many of the details were similar to those of Fletcher's engines." Glover (1967) credited the boiler with 205 tubes, which is the result of a later rebuilding with a Worsdell boiler when the original iron boilers wore out quickly because of the 40,000 miles/year usage.

Taken into LNER as E5, at which time they were used on secondary services but still at high annual mileage. The last retired in February 1929.