1998, ISBN: 9781156223505

Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: … Plus…

Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: The R class was an express passenger steam locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1951 to 1974. A long overdue replacement for the 1907-era A2 class 4-6-0, their development and construction was repeatedly delayed due to financial constraints caused by the Great Depression and later the manpower Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: The R class was an express passenger steam locomotive that ran on Victorian Railways from 1951 to 1974. A long overdue replacement for the 1907-era A2 class 4-6-0, their development and construction was repeatedly delayed due to financial constraints caused by the Great Depression and later the manpower and materials shortages of World War II and the immediate postwar period. Orders eventually totalling 70 locomotives were placed with the North British Locomotive Company of Glasgow. Once initial teething problems were overcome, R class locomotives proved to be a success and their power and speed enabled faster timetabled services. However, they were almost immediately superseded by mainline diesel-electric and electric locomotives on the VR from 1952 onwards. With successive orders of diesel-electric locomotives through the 1950s and 1960s gradually displacing them, all but seven of the class were withdrawn and cut up for scrap. Four of the remaining locomotives were later restored to operating condition between 1984 and 1998. These have seen use ranging from hauling special heritage train services through to substituting for modern diesel-electric locomotives on regular intercity rail services run by V/Line and West Coast Railway. Another surviving example, number R 704, was originally displayed at the Festival of Britain in 1951 and is now on permanent display at the Australian Railway Historical Society museum in North Williamstown, Victoria. Within a few years of the introduction of the A2 class 4-6-0 in 1907, it was clear that increasingly heavy train loads would require a more powerful locomotive on principal main lines. From as early as 1918, a series of drawings for potential 4-6-2 'Pacific' type locomotives began to emerge from the. More: Books, , Preserved-Steam-Locomotives-of-Australia~~Books-LLC, , , , , , , , , , General Books LLC<