4-4-4 Jubilee

[tatans]

The f-2  set the Canadian steam loco record of 112.5mph(I don't know where) and Omar Lavallee quotes " Though schedules seldom required speed in excess of 60mph, there are unofficial accounts of F-2's travelling at almost twice that rate when making up time" My childhood trips from Moose Jaw to Elbow (Yes, and we stopped at Eyebrow too) On one trip the conductor told us to sit in our seats, and we had a truly fast ride, would I like to have been in the loco.

[Autobus Prime]

tb:

Commuter service? Now that seems odd. It seems to me that you'd want tractive effort above all for that work, for quick acceleration. Were Montreal commuter trains particularly light and fast?

I am pretty sure that the locomotives of either class were not seen with more than about five passenger cars.  And - if I remember correctly, the F2a's (the first five Jubilees) pulled trains like the Chinook in Alberta, the Royal York in Ontario, and others in Montreal, each being no more than five cars long and consisting of new, lightweight coaches. 

Feel free to correct me if i'm wrong

 No as far as I'm aware you are correct. I've never seen shots of them with anything other than the light weight Angus shop built coaches.Lots of stops and starts on the Montreal commuter lines. I have heard that these loco's did accelerate quickly which was ideal for the commuter type runs they held down.

Rob

Folks:

Hmm...I think I know what I was missing.  These had boosters, didn't they?  That would help 'em start.

The Hiawatha resemblance definitely is there, now that it's been pointed out.  Neat.

From what is being said here, unless I'm mistaken, these must have worked well for CPR for similar reasons as the Midland's singles worked so well for them...both had short, fast trains to pull.  Of course, in one case you had a conservative design that was carried over, and in the other one you had an unusual design that was developed for the purpose.  I guess I just enjoy drawing parallels (except when it involves section lining, which is a very nice thing about CAD).

I wonder if the configuration gave any weight-distribution advantage?

[Isambard]

The 20 F1a 4-4-4's, numbered 2910 through 2929, were bult by Montreal Locomotive Works in 1937.

From Omer Lavallée's "Canadain Pacific Steam Locomotives"- "The fast, local intercity services for which the F1s were designed never materialized and they were assigned to secondary local passenger services on the prairies and in eastern Canada. However, one of these assignments, the Regina-Moose Jaw local train, called for the 16.4 km (10.2 miles) between Pasqua and Belle Plaine, Sask., to be effected in ten minutes, an average start-to-stop speed in excess of 98 km/h (61 mph). This was, for some time in the late 1940' and early 1950s, the fastest scheduled speed attained by a Canadian passenger train."

As a boy living in Moose Jaw I rode the "local" many times from 1945 to 1951 and was always thrilled with the high speed and those jack-rabbit starts and stops. As I recall there were three such stops between Moose Jaw and Regina.

Number 2928 is in good condition under cover at the Canadian Railway Museum (Exporail) in St. Constant, Québec, although difficult to view amongst the other rows of locomotives there.

[tatans]

Lucky as a child to ride a few times behind this type of loco on the prairies, I think there were 3 turns in the track and would these things ever move! I think the engineers used to see just how fast these things went,  loco, baggage car, coach with open windows and an open back door, as a child I think the estimated speed was 500 miles per hour, I'm sure it was. (and guess who never took a picture?)

[trolleyboy]

tb:

Commuter service? Now that seems odd. It seems to me that you'd want tractive effort above all for that work, for quick acceleration. Were Montreal commuter trains particularly light and fast?

I am pretty sure that the locomotives of either class were not seen with more than about five passenger cars.  And - if I remember correctly, the F2a's (the first five Jubilees) pulled trains like the Chinook in Alberta, the Royal York in Ontario, and others in Montreal, each being no more than five cars long and consisting of new, lightweight coaches. 

Feel free to correct me if i'm wrong

Ghonz

 

 No as far as I'm aware you are correct. I've never seen shots of them with anything other than the light weight Angus shop built coaches.Lots of stops and starts on the Montreal commuter lines. I have heard that these loco's did accelerate quickly which was ideal for the commuter type runs they held down.

Rob

[marknewton]

The 4-4-4 was not a popular wheel arrangement for the reasons largely pointed out above. There was one loco on the French Northern railway that had a three drum water tube firebox (basically an Admiralty three drum marine boiler) and this required the two trailing axles for support. I think this loco was rebuilt as a 4-6-0.

That must have been an interesting beast to work on! Didn't the Nord also have some 4-4-4T tank locos as well? Or am I thinking of another French railway?

A comment on the Canadian locomotives is that the CPR F2a was basically a scaled down copy of the Milwaukee class A "Hiawatha" Atlantic, but required the additional axle to meet lower Canadian track loadings.

Well, that hadn't ocurred to me either!

Cheers,

Mark.

[tatans]

 

In Canada bacon is bacon, ham is ham, back bacon is called Canadian bacon in the U.S. no one here knows what Canadian bacon is. I think Americans call back bacon peameal bacon as it is rolled in cornmeal. There were 5 F-2-a's built and 20 F-1-a's built.

[ghonz711]

tb:

Commuter service? Now that seems odd. It seems to me that you'd want tractive effort above all for that work, for quick acceleration. Were Montreal commuter trains particularly light and fast?

I am pretty sure that the locomotives of either class were not seen with more than about five passenger cars.  And - if I remember correctly, the F2a's (the first five Jubilees) pulled trains like the Chinook in Alberta, the Royal York in Ontario, and others in Montreal, each being no more than five cars long and consisting of new, lightweight coaches. 

Feel free to correct me if i'm wrong

Ghonz

 

[Autobus Prime]

 

I wonder why the 4-4-4 was more successful in Canada than the US?

From what I understand they were a mixed blessing,very fast but very slippery due to their very tall drivers.( 81 inches I believe ) They were best suited for commuter service which is what they spent most their time doing,mostly in and around Montreal.They were tried out west on longer range trains, but in that roll they were not an unqualified success. The Hudson's and Royal Hudson's were much better suited to teh heavy passenegr trians.

This one is preserved at the Steam and Tech museum in Ottawa.

Rob

tb:

Commuter service? Now that seems odd. It seems to me that you'd want tractive effort above all for that work, for quick acceleration. Were Montreal commuter trains particularly light and fast?

[M636C]

The 4-4-4 was not a popular wheel arrangement for the reasons largely pointed out above. There was one loco on the French Northern railway that had a three drum water tube firebox (basically an Admiralty three drum marine boiler) and this required the two trailing axles for support. I think this loco was rebuilt as a 4-6-0.

The Reading locomotives were built as 4-4-4 in 1915 (about the same time as the French loco) and the trailing truck was basically the same as the leading truck, not the modern design used later with Hudsons and Berkshires. It too had the truck to support a huge modified Wooten firebox more than twelve feet long by nine feet wide, thus over 100 square feet, a lot for basically an Atlantic type. There were four built, class C-1a numbered 110 to 113. The short coupled wheelbase and long rear overhang resulted in unsteady running at speed and in 1916, the four were rebuilt as class P-7b 4-4-2 type.

However, the firebox was shortened by two feet to allow the weight to be carried by a single axle and stability improved. The locomotives were renumbered 350 to 353 to match the "Atlantic" series.

Since this is a Model forum, it is worth mentioning that the A.C. Gilbert built "American Flyer" Atlantic type, which carried the Reading diamond badge on its tender, was a scale model of the P-7b (or P-7sb after superheating), the only Reading Atlantic that did not have the "camelback" layout. This was initially a 3/16" scale O gauge model but post WWII was an S gauge model.

A comment on the Canadian locomotives is that the CPR F2a was basically a scaled down copy of the Milwaukee class A "Hiawatha" Atlantic, but required the additional axle to meet lower Canadian track loadings.

M636C

[msowsun]

Here are two photos that show the difference between the two versions of CPR 4-4-4's. 

From : www.railarchive.net/randomsteam/index.html

The first class of semi-streamlined Jubilee 4-4-4s placed in service by the Canadian Pacific were the five engines of class F2a, delivered in 1936. Their running gear was unusual in at least two respects; the main rod connected to the first set of driving wheels instead of the second (as with the F1 class), and they had 80-inch disc drivers instead of the spoked drivers found on all other CPR steam locomotives, including the Royal Hudsons. The F2s, which weighed 238,000 pounds without tender, had cylinder dimensions of 17¼x28 inches, sustained 300 pounds per square inch of boiler pressure, and developed 26,550 pounds of tractive force. This was less than that of the F1 class, but their 70-square-foot grate area was larger, and their longer boilers provided 124% more heating surface and 122% more superheater surface. These steam-producing features would have given them a higher horsepower at speed. This photo of No. 3002 at Windsor, Ontario, was provided by Tom Rock of T.D.R. Productions. The photographer and date are unknown.

 

The Canadian Pacific was the only North American railroad to operate the 4-4-4 type on more than an experimental basis. In the later 1930s he railroad introduced two classes of 4-4-4, which it styled the "Jubilee" type in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of its transcontinental passenger service. Curiously, the F1a class was the second to be built, appearing in 1936-37. Eventually assigned to local passenger service, the F1s had 75-inch drivers and 16½x28-inch cylinders and a boiler pressure of 300 pounds per square inch. With these dimensions they exerted about 25,900 pounds of tractive force. Weighing 218,000 pounds, they had a grate area of 45 square feet, an evaporative heating surface of 2291 square feet, and 900 square feet of superheater surface. They were semi-streamlined in the fashion of the earlier F2s and the CPR's Royal Hudsons, delivered in 1937.

Above, No. 2926 of class F-1-a poses in Windsor, Ontario in a photo of unknown origin, courtesy of Tom Rock of T.D.R. Productions. Two examples of the F1a "Jubilees" survive including the last member of the class, No. 2929, currently in sad-looking condition at Steamtown National Historic Site.

[CNCharlie]

 Although I am a CN guy the Jubilee is my favourite locomotive so I thought a few bits of info might be good.

There were 2 versions of the Jubilee, the F2a built in 1936 and the F1a built in 1937/38 both semi-streamlined.  The F2 actually came first and had 80" drivers and was designed for sustained high speed operation. In fact one set the Canadian speed record for steam at 112.5 mph. There were 5 built. The F1a was a different but similar loco with 75" drivers and was slightly smaller. It was designed for short passenger trains where the runs involved many stops. L.A. Stuckey fired them for many miles and compared them to a prairie jack rabbit for their quick starts and stops. He also said that " their speed was limited by track conditions and the engineer's nerve. On the mainline, their rated 90 mph maximum was often exceeded." As previously noted they were used around Montreal but many were used on the prairies.

CN Charlie

[twhite]

Well, there's one way those handsome locos worked in the US--in a modified version, of course--they powered more Marx electric trains than any other loco the company ever put out.  I still have one in the attic--it's a sweet looking loco, even if it's a 2-4-2 instead of a 4-4-4.  Got it around 1949 or so.  Last time I checked, a couple of months ago, it was still running. 

Tom

[lvanhen]

naw - it was just a 4 and the guy stuttered!!

[R. T. POTEET]

I wonder why the 4-4-4 was more successful in Canada than the US?

Socialized medicine, perhaps?

[trolleyboy]

 

I wonder why the 4-4-4 was more successful in Canada than the US?

From what I understand they were a mixed blessing,very fast but very slippery due to their very tall drivers.( 81 inches I believe ) They were best suited for commuter service which is what they spent most their time doing,mostly in and around Montreal.They were tried out west on longer range trains, but in that roll they were not an unqualified success. The Hudson's and Royal Hudson's were much better suited to teh heavy passenegr trians.

This one is preserved at the Steam and Tech museum in Ottawa.

Rob

[marknewton]

A minor quibble - Lady Baltimore was built new, not a rebuild of a 4-4-2.

I would hazard a guess that the reason 4-4-4s were not built in any number in the US was simply that by the time four-wheel trailing trucks came into general use, there were few railroads that required a high-speed, low tractive effort loco optimised for hauling a light, short train. Those that did have such a requirement could either use existing power such as 4-4-2s or 4-6-2s, or some variety of diesel...

Mark.

[Packer]

The B&O did in fact rebuild a 4-4-2 into the 4-4-4 Lady Baltimore, although after the Reading ordered theirs.  The B&O version apparently wasn't much of a success and was scrapped after a relatively short service life.

Yes, the B&O's Lady Baltimore is the engine I was thinking of.

I wonder why the 4-4-4 was more successful in Canada than the US?

Becuase it's canada, they can make stuff work; like calling bacon ham. (wonder what they call bacon?)

Actually, I have no clue and can't find any info on it at all.

[don7]

The B&O did in fact rebuild a 4-4-2 into the 4-4-4 Lady Baltimore, although after the Reading ordered theirs.  The B&O version apparently wasn't much of a success and was scrapped after a relatively short service life.

Yes, the B&O's Lady Baltimore is the engine I was thinking of.

I wonder why the 4-4-4 was more successful in Canada than the US?

[Trevelyan1223]

The B&O did in fact rebuild a 4-4-2 into the 4-4-4 Lady Baltimore, although after the Reading ordered theirs.  The B&O version apparently wasn't much of a success and was scrapped after a relatively short service life.

[marknewton]

The Reading had locos that were built as 4-4-4s, but were soon converted to 4-4-2s - perhaps that is what you're thinking of?

Mark.

[don7]

Did any of the other Railroads in North America run 4-4-4's other than CPR on their Jubilee locomotive?

I seem to remember some sort of reference to another raiload converting 4-4-2 Atlantics to 4-4-4's.