Sarawak Government 4-4-0 Locomotives in Malaya

Class Bulan (Locobase 20961)

Data from "Tank Locomotive for the Sarawak Government Rys.",Locomotive Magazine, Volume XXIX (15 August 1923), p.225, 227. See also "Sarawak Government Railway" extracted from the Industrial Railway Society and archived at [], last accessed 25 November 2021; and "The Sarawak Government Railway -- new discovery for the OP", posted on the RailUKforums by Calthrop on 16 June 2015 at [], last accessed 25 November 2021 .Works numbers were 1362-1363 in 1914.

Apparently intended as a passenger railway in the British Protectorate, the SGR began construction in 1911 on a projected 27 miles (43.5 km) of track heading south from Kuching, its coastal capitals. In the event, only 10 miles (16 km) actually went into service. Peckett supplied three locomotives, Jean (0-4-0ST delivered in 1912) and these two. Bulan translates as "Moon" and Bintang ("Star"). They used outside frames and outside cylinders that drove on cranks that extended beyond the frames.

Opened on 1 August 1915, the short, short line operated primarily as a quarry line, serving two such facilities for decades. But the line lost 1,063,760 dollars (approximately 100,000 pounds sterling) by 1931, most of the amount after an adjacent road was paved.

Used sporadically and "unofficially" (according to Calthrop), the line's steam power showed its age. Planned replacement by diesels was delayed in 1941 when Japanese forces took Borneo. The occupiers ran both passenger and freight over the line until the end of the war.

The line closed in 1947, but steam had been replaced by a Ruston diesel a year or two before.