Hi, I´m Christian,
can me someone tell me something about the Russian Decapod (steam engine)? What for a railroad serve the destination Chicago-Florida ? How was the loco paint ?Exists some photo´s?
Thanks forwart!
The “Russian decapod”, wheel arrangement 2-10-0 was a steam locomotive for heavy freight, relative low speed. The reason they are called Russian-- were built by US for use by the Imperial Russian government in WWI, but the Bolshevik revolution cut off the deal and 200 locomotives were sold off to American railroads.
The Kalmbach book Model Railroader Cyclopedia, Vol. I, Steam Locomotives includes scale drawings, 11 photographs, and a listing of 28 railroads that had the decapods. I am not going to copy that list, but some of the better known railroads that ended up with at least some of the decapods included Atlantic Coast Line; Erie, GM&O, Orient, KCS, MoPac, SLSF (Frisco), Seaboard Air Line, Western Maryland.
“Serve destination Chicago- Florida?” That sounds like a passenger service question, and it sounds like these locos were suited mainly for slow heavy freight.
How painted? The photos in the Kalmback book look mostly like plain black, with silver or graphite smoke box on an SLSF and ACL loco.
There is one surviving Russian decapod, a former Frisco engine at the Illinois RR Museum in Union Illinois. It has a distinctive look, with the boiler high off the frame. And the tires on the drivers are wide because the engine was not built to American standard gauge, but to Russian gauge which might have been 5’. So the tires were made wide once they were reassigned to service in the USA.
Dave Nelson
SP obtained three from the EL Paso & South Western upon merger in 1924. Typical of EP&SW power they were dispised by operating and maintaince personal and except for conversion to oil and renumbering, very little was done to bring them to SP specifications (in contrast to the MT2 4-8-2’s which SP devoted vast resources to bring in compliance ) All three were retained for service on former EP&SW lines until retirements occured in the early thrities…
Dave
There’s another ex-Frisco Russian Decapod at the Age of Steam railroad Museum in Dallas, TX. You’re right about the look. The one in Dallas is, unfortunately, badly in need of some maintenance. I have some photos, but because of the way they have their equipment bunched up, there’s no way to get a decent full shot. So I have one of the smoke box, one of the middle boiler section, and one of the cab, etc.
There’s another Russian Decapod, also ex-Frisco, in Belton, MO. Another ex-Frisco in Altus, OK. And another ex-Frisco (seeing a pattern here?) in St Louis. One in Spencer, NC (ex-SAL, just to be different).
Most of that info on existing locomotives was found at a great website, http://www.steamlocomotive.com/, in their “Surviving Steam Locomotive Database” http://www.steamlocomotive.com/lists/
Regards
Ed
The locos were originally built to 5’ 0" guage, which is standard in Russia. A few railroads did in fact go to the trouble to reguage them, but installation of the wide tires was the original solution.
I believe the reason so many Frisco engines survive is that a few of them were leased to Eagle-Pitcher (a mining firm, I believe), when Frisco dieselized.
Ironically, US locomotive builders built a fleet of similar engines for the USSR during World War II.
The Russian decapods were built during WWI for Czarist Russia, but weren’t sent there due to the revolution. They were modified to U.S. standards and sold here.
SP’s decapods were not Russian decapods. SP’s were built in 1903 for the El Paso & Southwestern, and were acquired by SP’s Texas & New Orleans subsidiary in 1923. SP’s decapods were poor steaming, rough riding, and not anymore powerful than regular 2-8-0s of the time. They did have one more axle to spread out the engines’ weight, however.
Mark
The railroad I lived next to for years, the Minneapolis Northfield and Southern, had some of each!! They bought several 2-10-0’s towards the end of WW1 when the sale of them to the Bolsheviks was blocked. Then during WW2, one of the new 2-10-0’s going to the USSR was dropped by a crane while being loaded into a ship and was sent back to the builder (Baldwin?) for repairs. By the time the repairs were done, the war had ended and the US again disallowed locomotive sales to the Soviet Union, and the MN&S ended up buying that engine too!!
It’s something of a myth that the Russian Decapods were meant for “heavy” freight service, at least by North American standards. With a tractive effort of 51,490 pounds, they weren’t even as powerful as a USRA light 2-8-2 (54,600 pounds TE), and their boiler capacity was much less than that Mikado’s. The forte of these 2-10-0s was that they were able to apply their tractive effort on lightly built rail lines because their weight, roughly 184,000 pounds, was spread over 6 axles.
In the years immediately after WWI, Baldwin thought there was a market for such engines and developed its own light-axle-load 2-10-0 designs, though even the smallest of these was larger than the Russians. But for a heavy-duty 2-10-0 you have to look to the much larger versions of this wheel arrangement built for the Pennsylvania RR (road class I1, 1916 and later) and the Western Maryland (road class I-2, 1927).
So long,
Andy