Erie Other Articulated Locomotives in the USA

Class L1 (AERJ 1908) (Locobase 5700)

Data from table in 1908 AERJ, which together with an account -- "Mallet Compound Locomotives" -- in Locomotive Magazine, Vol XIII (15 September 1907), p. 160, resolved a Locobase mystery.

These three Anguses were the only camelbacks with this arrangement. The author drafted two other entries (2799, 5355 -- since deleted) with different data -- in one case a boiler with tubes some three feet longer and another much more heating surface. Not able to determine for sure which was the valid data, he decided to show all three until the questions could be answered.

Could the 24' tubes have been the original length, but soon seen as overwhelming both the fireman and his grate without any commensurate gain in heating value? The tube count certainly suggests as much. The two earlier accounts showed 446 tubes and a total of 6,629 sq ft of heating surface. A later 1907 AERJ raised the tube count to 468, but shortened the length to 21 ft (total ehs 6,108 sq ft). In the June 1908 account of the testing, we see still fewer tubes and a lower overall heating surface area.

The LM report noted too that each engine set had equalization among the four drivers on each side and the front set was cross-equalized in front of the leading drivers.

Known at one time as the Angus, they were the only camelback Mallets of this wheel arrangement. Drury (1993) comments that "On the job they proved mostly that it took a skilled and strong fireman to produce the power they were designed to deliver."

In 1921, they were rebuilt by Baldwin as 2-8-8-2s; see Locobase 7745.

In 2004, MTH modelers unveiled its model of the 0-8-8-0 and explained the nickname as follows:

"The L1 obtained the nickname "Angus-type" as a result of noted railroad operations writer Angus Sinclair's comments that the L1 would dry up all the country's canals and make all forms of water transportation obsolete thanks to the engine's incredible thirst. Because only three L1 locomotives were constructed, Sinclair's comments never rang true but the engine did establish the use of Mallet type engines beyond narrow gauge light duty use."

(see [], visited 11 November 2004).

---

Class M-1 (Locobase 16300)

Data from Chris Hohl in his 31 August 2017 email calling attention to this design. See also "Heavy 2-6-8-0 Mallet for the Erie", Railway Locomotive, Volume XXI [21], No 12 (December 2010), pp. 483-484; and Alvin F Staufer, Erie Railroad Steam Locomotive Diagrams (self-published, nd), p. 83, supplied in May 2005 by Allen Stanley from his extensive Rail Data Exchange collection. Hohl also noted a typo in the description of the Triplex's wheel arrangement and an error in the valve gear description.

Solitary pusher converted at the Meadville shops from Consolidation H-22 class 1830 (Locobase 9201) by removing the pony truck and adding a 2-6-0 boiler and running gear "Mallet kit" offered by Baldwin and carrying the LP cylinders. The power system included a cylindrical Vanderbilt tender. R&LE proclaimed the design "an excellent example of this method of combination by which a greatly enlarged power capacity can be had with a comparatively small outlay for new material."

Fifteen-inch (381 mm) piston valves actuated by Stephenson gear supplied steam to the HP cylinders and slide valves, also opened by Stephenson link motion fed the LP cylinders. The Consolidation's smokebox was transformed into a combustion chamber that contained a Baldwin "reheater" that restored some of the lost temperature to the steam leaving the HP cylinders. The Mogul section housed a Baldwin feed water heater bundle of 422 tubes of 2" diameter and 7 foot (2,134 mm) length; its heating surface area came to 1,548 sq ft (143.81 sq m). An 11" core held a flue conveyed the reheated exhaust to the smokebox and the LP cylinders.

It proved to be too small to handle the Susquehanna inclines for which it was intended. Despite R&LE's enthusiastic appraisal, this is one of the few (or perhaps the only) such "Mallet kit" Baldwin built.

While Erie went on to test the P-1 2-8-8-8-2(Locobase 3300), the railroad converted 2900 back to the 2-8-0 from which it had been derived in February 1916.