Prairie 61XX locomotive

Introduction - page 1

This is a new project started in November 2006. The Foden is nearly finished and waiting for paint to dry is boring so a start on the Prairie has been made.

The Prairie being built is from the drawings done by Trevor Shortland and updated by Reeves. It is the so called large Prairie, a tank engine with a 2-6-2 T wheel arrangement in the 51XX and 61XX class. Over 300 large Prairies were built between 1903 and 1949 and found use on the GWR as suburban passenger and freight engines. The driving wheels were 5ft 8in and transferred a tractive effort of 27340 lbs with a boiler running at 225 psi. The valve gear is Stevenson operating on two 18" x 30" cylinders. Preserved examples are at Llangollen and Didcot. The main differences of the 61XX class over the 51XX was the higher boiler pressure and thus greater tractive effort otherwise the loco's were very similar.

A 51XX loco 4144 at Didcot

A 61XX loco 6106 at Didcot

A start has been made on the frames working from guillotined black MS sheet. Unfortunately my mill table is not long enough to take the whole length of the frame for machining in one go, so the frames have to be moved at some stage to have a second bite at the machining. The frames have a 7/32" joggle at the rear end making the frame set narrower at the rear for the trailing bogie. The joggle has been put in using a 12 ton garage press and a joggle tool machined to give the correct curve over the required length. Currently all the holes are being drilled and some photos will appear on the next update.