Power type Steam Build date 1942–1946 | Designer Maj. J. W. Marsh Total produced 2120 | |
Builder |
The United States Army Transportation Corps S160 Class is a class of 2-8-0 Consolidation steam locomotive designed for use in Europe during World War II for heavy freight work. A total of 2,120 were built and they worked on railroads across the world, including Africa, Asia, all of Europe and South America.
Contents
Design
During the 1930s, the United States Army Transportation Corps approved update of a Baldwin Locomotive Works World War I design in contingency for war transportation, to create the S159 Class. During the period of World War II when America was neutral, the government of Franklin D. Roosevelt approved the Lend-Lease supply to the United Kingdom of the S200 Class, designed specifically to fit into the restricted British loading gauge.
With America's entry to World War II, the USATC needed a developed design from which to create a volume of locomotive power for the wrecked railways of Europe, which they could use to deploy military hardware and civilian goods. Hence the design created by Maj. J. W. Marsh from the Railway Branch of the Corps of Engineers learnt from both previous locomotives, designed on austerity principles and built using methods which created efficient and fast construction speed over long life, such as axlebox grease lubricators and rolled plates preferred to castings.
With cast frames and cast wheels, the front two driving axles were sprung independently from the rear two driving axles to allow for running on poor quality track. The larger tender layout was derived from the similar design for the WD Austerity 2-8-0, with the coal bunker inset above the water tank to improve visibility when running backwards.
British deployment
800 locomotives were constructed in 1942/3 in thirteen batches, split between ALCO, Baldwin and Lima Locomotive Works. Shipped to South Wales and dispatched from the GWR locomotive depot at Newport, Ebbw Junction, the first 43 locomotives were transferred to the LNER works at Doncaster for completion, and later running in over the East Coast Main Line. This started a pattern whereby each of the four British railway companies eventually deployed a total of 400 S160's under the guise of "running in," but factually replacing damaged stock and increasing the capacity of the British railway system to allow for shipping of military pre-invasion equipment and troops. The eventual deployment of S160's were:
The second batch of 400 S160's were prepared for storage by USATC personnel at the Great Western's Ebbw Junction locomotive depot in the immediate run-up to D-Day. After the D-Day invasion of Normandy, the locomotives deployed across Britain again began to be collected and be refurbished at Ebbw Junction in preparation for shipment to Europe.
Operational failures
The S160's were designed for quick and efficient building, not long term operations, thus compromises in design led to some difficulties in operations. The axle box grease lubricators were not very efficient, particularly when maintenance procedures lapsed or were delayed for operational war reasons, and so axle boxes often ran hot. Braking was poor for European standards, with a Westinghouse steam brake used for the locomotive, which was woefully insufficient due to the long distance from the driver's valve to the brake cylinder.
A major fault of the S160 was use of a single water gauge of a Klinger design unfamiliar to the U.K. crews. If the valves were not fully open the crews could be mislead into thinking that the water level was adequate, even though it was becoming dangerously low. When a low water condition allowed the crown sheet to overheat, the stay bolts holding the crown sheet would fail with little warning, resulting in a boiler explosion. In a space of ten months, three UK S160s suffered a collapse of the firebox crown, with the first leading to the death of a GWR fireman on No. 2403 in November 1943. Although there are claims that the stay bolts or firebox design were less than for domestic locomotive boilers, the locomotives were equipped with a "(b)oiler built to comply in all aspects with the A.S.M.E. Boiler Code, except that the shell shall have a factor safety of 4."
Deployment
Judging accurately the actual deployment of 2120 locomotives is difficult, but the following numbers are referenced:
Europe
The British locomotives, together with those shipped direct from America were also similarly deployed first with troops reclaiming Europe, and then subsumed throughout European national railways as replacements for their destroyed stock after the war:
Africa
At the same time as S160s were being deployed into Britain, when General Patton led American troops in Operation Torch into the North African Campaign, their Transport Corps brought with them S160s. These locomotives moved across the north of the continent as Patton's troops waged war, and when the troops moved to Italy the majority of their S160s moved with them. These locomotives, supplemented with those directly imported from America, were eventually to create a group of 243 locomotives, subsumed by the Italian State Railway's to become the FS Class 736 class.
Americas
Asia
After World War II, the reconstruction of the world required transportation. The S160s were deployed to Asia under the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, to China and South Korea.
South Korea
100 S160s were shipped to South Korea in 1947, where the Korean National Railroad designated them Sori2 (소리2) class, numbering them 소리2-1 through 소리2-100. They were not popular with Korean locomotive crews, as they were right hand drive on a left-running railway. In KNR service they were used primarily in yard duty and occasional short local trains.
North Korea
North Korea's S160s came from the Soviet Union and China, starting almost immediately following the end of the Second World War., and the Korean State Railway eventually numbered them in the 8000 series. Ironically, the S160's were used by both North and South Korean forces during this conflict.
Class Designation
Although "S160" has been popularly adopted as the class identification for this design of War Department Consolidation, it can not be verified as an official designation despite considerable research. The S160 designation is not found in 1942 and 1943 Baldwin drawing indexes, the Lima drawing index for the class, nor in meeting minutes in which representatives of the War Department and the three builders made several design decisions prior to production. It is also not found in any of approximately 900 engineering drawings which are still in existence. The Baldwin designation for the design, 2-8-0-19S, is found in their drawing indexs, on some drawings, and is stamped onto major locomotive components on examples built by Baldwin.
Variants
There were several major variants of the S160 class, excluding inlife design development:
Preservation
Mainly due to their numbers, rather than the design or build quality, at least 26 examples of the S160 have survived into preservation, making them one of the most numerous survivors of all Mainline Steam Locomotives: