LNWR A Class

Description

The London & North Western Railway A Class was a class of 0-8-0 steam locomotives. From 1893 to 1900, Crewe Works built 111 of these engines, which had three-cylinder compound arrangement, and were designed by Francis William Webb. Built as the first of the 0-8-0 series, they were the “Genesis” of what would eventually become the “Super D”. Used on all types of good services from Coal traffic to slogging heavy goods over Shap, they quickly became one of the most powerful locomotives on the LNWR network. However, like other Webb compounds, they proved problematic & overly complicated, so all were eventually rebuilt by George Whale (LNWR CME after Webb) into simple expansion engines. All became LNWR Class Cs, C1s and Ds between 1904 to 1910, the last A being rebuilt in 1911. All eventually being built into LNWR G1s and then into G2s “Super Ds”, which were still running in 1962. One specific interest in the LNWR A Class is the exhaust beat. Being a 3 cylindered compound, with the 2 smaller cylindered being “funneled” into the middle cylinder, the locomotive only gave two beats per rotation of the wheel.

The LNWR A Class brings some much needed LNWR love into Train Simulator & a look into the history of more uncommon & forgotten locomotives. I hope you all enjoy it!