LNER 2-6-2 Locomotives in Great_Britain

Class V1/V3 (Locobase 3773)

Data from Bryan Attewell ([] Steam locomotive simulator (April 2000 edition). These are tank versions of Gresley's 3-cylinder Prairies, but scaled-down for branch-line mixed-traffic use. 82 V1s entered service in 1930. Ten V3s were added in 1939; the principal difference was a hike in boiler pressure to 200 psi. Most of the V1s (63 in all) also had their boiler pressure raised to 200 psi and were redesignated V3.

Class V2 Green Arrows (Locobase 2510)

Data from diagram archived at [], last accessed 12 July 2009. See also Richard Marsden's "The Gresley V2 2-6-2 Prairie 'Green Arrow' Class" entry in his online LNER Encyclopedia, last accessed 13 August 2017.

Although the high axle loading limited their travels on the LNER, these powerfu three-cylinder, mixed-traffic Prairies rang up such performances as pulling a 600-ton "Scotch Goods" express freight at 60 mph (97 kph) on level traffic. During World War II, says Hollingsworth (1982), these engines pulled as many as 25 cars on a single troop train.

Steam production came from a boiler that had a large percentage of superheater area for a British engine. Admission came through 9" (279 mm) piston valves. Although early versions included rotary cam poppet valves, Kylchap exhaust, and the French-developed ACFI (Compagnie des Auxiliaires des Chemins de Fer et de l'Industrie) feedwater heater, the finaly design took out both the poppet valves and the feed water heater.

Marsden comments that the monobloc casting method that included all three cylinders, their valve steam chests, and related steam passages, eliminated leaks, and allowed for better streamlining in the design of the steam passages. Tweaking the design in the 1940s reduced cracking for a while, but in the 1950s, British Railways began replacing the monoblocs with three separate valve castings. Ultimately 71 of the class received the modification.

The one weak spot in the design was the swing-link self-centering pony truck, which was replaced after a couple of derailments in 1946. Installing Thompson's truck design from his L1 2-6-4T class (Locobase 3123), which used transverse springing and recentering from the side, eliminated the problem.

V2s ran well into the 1960s. Only 60800 (ex-4771) was preserved. It found a permanent home in 1971 at the National Railway Museum in York and was restored to running condition in 1973.

Class V4 (Locobase 3127)

Data from Richard Marsden's "The Gresley V4 2-6-2 'Bantam Cock' Class Locomotives" entry in his online LNER Encyclopedia, last accessed 13 August 2017 at []. (Thanks to Seth Crawford, whose 20 October 2020 email corrected Locobase's information about Gresley's death in 1941.)

A light version of the very successful V2s, these smaller Prairies had 152 sq ft of firebox heating surface. They had 7" (178 mm) piston valves. 3401 bore the name "Bantam Cock" and 3402 was informally, but popularly, known as the "Bantam Hen".

The experimental nature of this light mixed-duty design is reflected in the fitting of the second engine's firebox with a Nicholson syphon, which rarely appeared in British engines. It proved troublesome, frequently breaking stays, and was replaced in 1945 by one identical to that of the 3401.

Although they seemed satisfactory, Gresley, their designer, died in 1941 and series production never took place.