2-8-0 "Consolidation" Steam Locomotives in the USA

Class 19/910 (Locobase 13326)

Data from Baldwin Locomotive Works Specification for Engines as digitized by the DeGolyer Library of Southern Methodist University Volume 36

, p. 64. Works numbers were 35197-35199 in September 1910 and 36182-36185 in March 1911

Donovan Hofsommer gives the ownership blow-by-blow and Locobase has the highlights..The Wichita Falls Route included the Wichita Falls & Southern Railway, the Wichita Falls & Northwestern, Wishita Falls & Northwestern of Texas, the Wichita Falls & Wellington as well as the Altus, Wichita Falls & Hollis.

The WF&NW took delivery of all seven Consolidations in 1910-1911. At the time of their purchase, the railway operated over 359 miles of track in the Texas Panhandle and adjacent Oklahoma. Three years later, the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway Company of Texas leased the WF&NW of Texas and the WF&W. The 2-8-0s took new MKT numbers at that point.

Class 22 (Locobase 13701)

Data from Baldwin Locomotive Works Specification for Engines as digitized by the DeGolyer Library of Southern Methodist University, Volume 36, p 66. Works numbers were 36182-36185 in March 1911.

Not long after the Wichita Falls Route took delivery of these Consolidations, they sold the quartet to the Missouri-Kansas-Texas, which renumbered them 913-916. 914 was sold to the Kansas City, Mexico & Orient.

Class G (Locobase 7729)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange; and Baldwin Locomotive Works Specification for Engines as digitized by the DeGolyer Library of Southern Methodist University, Volume19, p. 256. See also Sylvan R Wood, Locomotives of the Katy (Cambridge, Mass:Railway & Locomotive Historical Society, Inc, January 1944), p 25. Works numbers were 13740-13741, 13745, 13751-13752 in September 1893.

Baldwin supplied Consolidations in both compound- and simple-expansion variants. The first of this wheel arrangement on the Katy, the "decidely conservative" railroad finding that their very successful Moguls could no longer pull the desired amount of train load.

The compounds came first, using a cylinder volume identical to that of the F-class Ten-wheelers supplied in the same year. The specifications page archived in the DeGolyer Library show that this class was ordered with 15" HP and 25" LP (381 x 635 mm) cylinders.

Sylvan Wood concluded it was "evident" that the the four-cylinder compounds "did not come up to expectations, as the engines acquired in 1894 and 1895 [Locobase 7730] were equipped with simple cylinders."

Class G1/K-6-c (Locobase 7730)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange; and DeGolyer, Volume 19, p. 163. See also See also Sylvan R Wood, Locomotives of the Katy (Cambridge, Mass:Railway & Locomotive Historical Society, Inc, January 1944), p 25. Works numbers were 14078-14082 in August 1894, 14297-14300 in April 1895.

A year after Baldwin delivered compound Consolidations (Locobase 7729), they supplied the simple-expansion counterparts shown in this entry. 230 and 240-245 were produced in 1894, 246-250 arrived in 1895. As delivered, the G1s trailed tenders with loaded weights of 82,000 lb (37,195 kg).

The grate grew wider although overall firebox heating surface remained essentially unchanged, which suggests that the grate had been repositioned over the drivers rather than between the frames.

"These engines handled the heavy coal traffic for many years," wrote Sylvan Wood, "and to all accounts were a good engine."

These were later superheated; see Locobase 7744.

Class G2/K-7 (Locobase 7731)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange. (Many thanks to Greg Maxwell for his 4 September 2021 giving a thorough history of the class, large chunks are directly quoted below.) Works numbers were 25082-25086 in August 1902.

According to Greg Maxwell, This quintet was "purchased at a time the Katy was in great need of additional motive power and the major locomotive builders had large backlogs that delayed deliveries."The MK&T apparently asked the Schenectady works of the newly formed American Locomotive Company to duplicate the Boston & Maine K-5 Consolidations (Locobase 4123) then under construction.

As a result, "The MK&T G-2 and B&M K-5 engines were dimensionally identical."

"There were a few cosmetic differences," continues Maxwell, "such as having the safety-valves and whistle in a turret behind the steam dome, location of the air pump and bell and the Katy engines having slightly larger tenders with arch-bar trucks."

Maxwell adds that "What made the G-2 locomotives stand out was that they were the first simple engines on the MK&T delivered with piston valves, nine years ahead of the H-1 Pacifics."

Although Schenectady's boiler certainly was equal to supplying the cylinders in these Consolidations and the grate area is clearly sufficient, the reported firebox heating surface is far from enough.

The Katy superheated the class in 1917; see Locobase 16154.

Class G3/K-6b (Locobase 7737)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange. See also DeGolyer, Volume 19, p. 269; and Samuel M Vauclain, "Broad Firebox Locomotives, Baldwin Locomotive Works, Record of Recent Construction No 27 (Philadelphia: BLW, 1901) , pp. 208-210. Works number was 14347.

The camelback locomotive layout operated almost exclusively in the anthracite regions of Pennsylvania that had seen its invention by John Wootten in the 1870s. Once in a great while, though, other railroads would sample the big firebox. According to Drury (1993), the Katy's adoption of the few they acquired was motivated by a wish to burn the low-grade coal they were extracting from mines near McAlester, Oklahoma.

The first such engine for the Katy was this Baldwin product, which was unusually lavish in its accommodations for the fireman in the rear -- the overhead canopy even had windows. The engineer's cab, which straddled the boiler over the second and third drivers, had a clerestory and three panes a side. The specs report that the firebox was based directly on a Reading design and showed a heating surface area of 223 sq ft (20.72 sq m). To handle the very fine, dusty coal, Baldwin adopted the long-combustion chamber version of the Wootten. They "exmployed a high brick wall in the combustion chamber, and a low, open, single exhaust in a short smokebox in front."

Burning slack coal in a big firebox seemed a promising idea, reinforced perhaps by the MKT's Superintendent of Motive Power Wiilliam O"Herin's 7 March 1898 letter to Samuel Vauclain. In it, O'Herin reported a fuel savings in dollars of $29.05 over a round trip of 314 miles (505 km). So the railroad ordered two more (Locobase 7739).

By 1904, however, the firebox was 2" (50.8 mm) shorter and possibly the combustion chamber had been reduced as well.

As with the other camelbacks, this one would be rebuilt as a conventional-cab engine in June 1909.

It was sold for scrap in October 1924 to Hyman Michaels Company.

Class G4/K-6-b (Locobase 7739)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange. See also DeGolyer, Volume 22, p. 285; Volume 24, p. 47; and Samuel M Vauclain, "Broad Firebox Locomotives, Baldwin Locomotive Works, Record of Recent Construction No 27 (Philadelphia: BLW, 1901) , pp. 208-210. (Thanks to Chris Hohl for his 6 June 2017 email noting the correct coal capacity and an earlier email reporting the original boiler pressure.) Works numbers were 18103 in September 1900 and 19391 in August 1901.

As noted in Locobase 7737, the camelback was rare outside of Pennsylvania. But the Katy had some low-calorie coal coming out of its McAlester mines and wanted to burn it in the wide Wootten fireboxes. A few years after the single G3, the railroad bought two G4s, which were a bit bigger and had longer boilers. They also had much shorter combustion chambers. Their boilers were delivered set to pop at 190 psi (13.1 bar), but were soon reset to the 200 psi shown in the specs.

Like the G3, they were converted to conventional cab engines. 437 was modified in September 1909 and the 432 in October 1910.

Class G5/K-8 (Locobase 7740)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange. See also DeGolyer, Volume 25, p. 39. Works number was 21389 in December 1902.

Continuing its acquisition of a few camelbacks (see Locobases 7738 & 7739), the Katy acquired this substantially larger example a year after the second of the two G4s was delivered. Little increased in grate, the firebox actually had a little less heating surface overall. The tubes were longer and there were more of them, hence the generous evaporative heating surface area.

The last of its kind, this camelback was converted to a conventional cab in 1913; it now fell in with the 492-493 (Locobase 7742) in the K-8 class. Another rebuild in 1925 fitted the K-8 class with a superheater and piston valves (Locobase 7743).

Class G6/K-6-a (Locobase 7741)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange. See also DeGolyer, Volume 22, p. 284 and Volume 24, p. 46. Works numbers were 18072 in August 1900 and 19332-19335 in August 1901.

Apparently the Katy wanted to compare the two G4s (which had Wootten fireboxes and are shown in Locobase 7739) with the conventional firebox that had half the grate area. Interestingly, the latter's total firebox heating surface was only 27 sq ft (2.51 sq m) less than the much broader grate.

The Katy's diagram book shows higher weights of 147,215 lb (66,776 kg) on the drivers and engine weight of 161,415 lb (73,217 kg).

Class G7/K-8 (Locobase 7742)

Data from MKT 1903 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange. See also DeGolyer, Volume 25, p. 38. Works numbers were 21326-21327 in November 1902.

The Katy appears to have been sampling firebox designs as they built locomotives with similar boiler dimensions, but three quite different widths of fireboxes. The camelbacks, fitted with 96" (2,438 mm) wide furnaces, appear in Locobase 7739. The typical narrow firebox with the grate positioned above the frame (41"/1,041 mm, and thus wider than the traditional 34" grate), appeared in the 431 and 433-436 shown in Locobase 7741. So this pair took the middle road, entering service a year later with 66" (1,676 mm) fireboxes.

They were later superheated; see Locobase 7743

Class K-10 (Locobase 7738)

Data from MKT 5 1939 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange.

According to Drury (1993) this class of Consolidations, purchased "...after a decade of tentativeness", was delivered with 22" diameter cylinders and 61" diameter drivers. Locobase doesn't know for sure when they might have been upgraded as shown in the specs.

They didn't enjoy particularly long lives as they were supplanted in road service by the Mikados and were too big and heavy to displace the 2-6-0s on branch-line operations. Almost all had been scrapped by 1940.

Class K-6-c - superheated (Locobase 7744)

Data from MKT 5 1939 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange.

Locobase is intrigued by the Katy's willingness to update Consolidations of such small size and advanced age (1894 - see Locobase 7730 for their data on delivery). In contrast to many such conversions to superheating, the modification sacrificed little heating surface area. Also, the flues had the larger of the two diameters characteristic of the Type A superheater.

Class K-7 - superheater (Locobase 16154)

Data from LR&N CO 1 1925 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in August 2013 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange.

The saturated-steam Consolidations delivered in 1902 (Locobase 7731) were all fitted with superheaters in 1917. It was a typical tradeoff of tubes and flues that resulted in an adequate power upgrade. Piston valves replaced slide valves, but the quintet still used Stephenson link motion to actuate them.

NB: Superheater area is an estimated based on other US locomotives with similar superheater installations.

Twenty years after they entered Katy service, the entire class was transferred in April 1923 to the Louisiana Railway & Navigation to run on the L&A of Texas.

Class K-8 - superheated (Locobase 7743)

Data from MKT 5 1939 Locomotive Diagrams supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange.

The original pair of K-8 conventional Consolidations (Locobase 7742) received superheaters in the 1920s along with the rebuilt 494 (originally a camelback) with the usual trade-off of evaporative heating surface for superheater area.

They continued to serve as branch-line freight locomotives throughout World War II. 668 and 670 went to the scrapper in 1947; 669 lasted until 1950.