Big Boy and Challenger.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

I've come across something on another forum that has got me asking questions, and this is the first place I thought of for an answer.

Question: Did the Big Boy and Challenger locomotives ever work outside the UP system. Say, B&O for instance. Was a Challenger ever built in narrow gauge?

Awaiting your replies.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by jeffrey-wimberly

I've come across something on another forum that has got me asking questions, and this is the first place I thought of for an answer.

Question: Did the Big Boy and Challenger locomotives ever work outside the UP system. Say, B&O for instance. Was a Challenger ever built in narrow gauge?

Awaiting your replies.

In steam day operations, locomotives were used on home rails only most of the time because of spare parts and steam engine maintenance was unique to their engines.

However, that said, D&RGW did receive duplicate copies of the UP Challenger and sold them after the war to the Clinchfield. They were almost identical to the 3985 which is used for special trips today.

At least one of the UP Challengers was leased for temporary duty to the D&RGW in1950. This was not common for the UP but it did happen locally.

[Train 284]

There were some Mallets used on narrow gauge lines in the US and around the world. But I don't think there were ever any narrow gauge Challengers or Big Boys except for the Rio Grande challengers like bangert1 said.

[MidlandPacific]

Northern Pacific and Spokane, Portland and Seattle both had Challengers, as did Delaware & Hudson, Western Maryland and Western Pacific. But the Big Boy was unique to UP.

The Grande engines came in two types - the L-105s were built before WWII, and the L-97s were copies of the UP engines that it got during the war, at the behest of the War Production Board - the latter were the engines sold to the Clinchfield.

Most narrow gauge articulateds (and by this I mean Mallet compounds or simple articulateds, not Shays or other geared engines) in the US were 2-6-6-2s, and there weren't many of them - the Uintah Railroad had a pair, and the NdeM had several more. The D&RGW played around with a pair of designs for a 2-8-8-2, but it never built them.

[twhite]

Actually, the Rio Grande wanted more of their own Baldwin-built L-105 4-6-6-4's during the war, but designs were frozen by the War Board. The road was instead assigned 6 Alco-built Challengers identical to the UP locos to the road, which became Rio Grande's 3800 series. The Alco's had a TE of 97,000, somewhat less than the Baldwins, which had 105,000 lb. TE and had been designed specifically by Baldwin for the Rio Grande's mountainous profile. Rio Grande never liked the Alco's and sold them immediately after the war, I think most or all of them went to the Clinchfield.

The only narrow-gauge American Mallets I can think of were the 2-6-6-2's built for the Uintah Railroad in western Colorado/Eastern Utah. They were tank mallets, but were later converted to tender mallets when they were sold to the Sumpter Valley Ry. in Oregon.

Tom