Norfolk & Western 1218

Norfolk & Western 1218
Norfolk and Western Railway 1218 in railfan service in 1987
Power type	Steam
Builder	N&W's Roanoke Shops
Serial number	340
Build date	1943
Configuration	2-6-6-4
UIC classification	(1′C)C2′ h4
Gauge	4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)
Leading wheel diameter	33 in (838 mm)
Driver diameter	70 in (1,778 mm)
Trailing wheel diameter	42 in (1,067 mm)
Axle load	72,000 lb (32.7 tonnes)
Weight on drivers	433,350 lb (196.6 tonnes)
Locomotive weight	573,000 lb (259.9 tonnes)
Locomotive & tender combined weight	951,600 lb (431.6 tonnes)
Fuel type	Coal
Fuel capacity	60,000 lb (27.2 tonnes)
Water capacity	22,000 US gal (83,000 l; 18,000 imp gal)
Boiler pressure	300 lbf/in² (2.07 MPa)
Firegrate area	122 sq ft (11.3 m2)
Heating surface: Tubes and flues	6,052 sq ft (562.2 m2)
Heating surface: Firebox	587 sq ft (54.5 m2)
Superheater area	2,703 sq ft (251.1 m2)
Cylinders	Four, simple articulated
Cylinder size	24 × 30 in (610 × 762 mm)
Valve gear	Baker
Valve type	Piston valves
Tractive effort	114,000 lbf (507.10 kN)
Factor of adhesion	3.44
Career	Norfolk & Western Railway
Class	A
Number in class	19 of 43
Locale	United States, South and Midwest
Retired	1959
Restored	1987
Current owner	O. Winston Link Museum
Disposition	On display

Norfolk & Western 1218 is a steam locomotive that at one time was the strongest-pulling operational steam locomotive in the world. It is a four-cylinder simple articulated locomotive with a 2-6-6-4 (Whyte system) wheel arrangement. The Norfolk & Western Railway built it in 1943 at its Roanoke Shops in Roanoke, Virginia, and it was part of the Norfolk & Western's "A class". It was retired from regular rail service in 1959, but Norfolk & Western successor Norfolk Southern Railway operated it in excursion service from 1987 to 1992. Today it is on display at the Virginia Museum of Transportation in Roanoke.

Historic significance

Norfolk & Western 1218 is the sole survivor of the railroad's A class, and indeed the only surviving 2-6-6-4 steam locomotive in the world. While smaller than Union Pacific's famous and more numerous Challenger Class of 4-6-6-4 locomotives, Norfolk and Western's design racked up unmatched records of performance in service.

During 1218's excursion career, it was the most powerful operational steam locomotive in the world, with a tractive effort of 114,000 pounds-force (507.10 kN), well above the next-strongest-pulling operational steam locomotive (Union Pacific 3985, with a tractive effort of 97,350 lbf (433.0 kN)). Despite its high tractive effort for starting heavy trains, it could easily run 70 miles per hour (113 km/h) and more.

Famed railroad photographer O. Winston Link's most famous photograph, "Hotshot Eastbound", was of one of 1218's sister engines at speed, passing a drive in theater in Ieager, WV in August 1956.

Operational history

Norfolk & Western used 1218 and the other A-class locomotives primarily for fast freight trains, but they also pulled heavy coal trains on the flatter districts of the Norfolk & Western system, and reportedly even pulled heavy passenger trains at times.

After Norfolk & Western retired 1218 in 1959, Union Carbide bought it to use as a backup boiler in an industrial plant. In 1965 steam preservationist F. Nelson Blount bought 1218 for his Steamtown collection, which today the National Park Service operates. According to Steam Over Scranton: The Locomotives of Steamtown by Gordon Chappell, "Eventually, the transportation museum at Roanoke, Virginia, had obtained 1218 on loan from the Steamtown Foundation in Vermont for temporary exhibit. Over a period of years that museum came to regard the locomotive as its property, not a loan, and the Norfolk and Western (Norfolk Southern) eventually got into the matter when it desired to overhaul the locomotive for operation for publicity purposes, railfan excursions, and other special events. While the Steamtown Foundation apparently had a clear title to the locomotive and the Roanoke museum did not, the N&W put further pressure on the Steamtown group by indicating it would never allow the locomotive to move over its rails out of Roanoke, effectively the only way Steamtown could get it back. Since Steamtown had no answer to this stand, and was by then in the process of moving to Scranton, Pennsylvania, the Steamtown Board decided to accept two diesel- electric locomotives from the Norfolk and Western, which by then had come under the corporate umbrella of the Norfolk Southern, in exchange for giving the Norfolk Southern clear title to No. 1218."

Norfolk Southern offered two diesel locomotives - Nickel Plate GP-9, No. 514, and former Wabash SW-8, No. 132 - in exchange for No. 1218.

Chappell continues, "In 1982, Norfolk & Western merged with Southern Railway to become today's Norfolk Southern Railway, and Norfolk & Western president Robert B. Claytor became the first president of Norfolk Southern. Bob Claytor's brother W. Graham Claytor, Jr. had started a steam excursion program at Southern Railway when he had been an executive, and then its president, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Both Claytor brothers were great rail preservationists and champions of maintaining some historic steam operations. Bob Claytor had Norfolk Southern restore 1218 for its steam program. On May 10, 1985, Norfolk Southern pulled 1218 from its park display for restoration, on January 16, 1987 it was fired up, and on March 26, 1987, 1218 ran a break-in run from the steam shops at Irondale, Alabama to Wilton, Alabama. It entered excursion service and pulled many excursion trains until the end of the 1991 season, when it went for an overhaul. This overhaul was in progress when Norfolk Southern canceled its steam program in late 1994."

Current status

Today 1218 is owned by the O. Winston Link Museum in Roanoke, Virginia, and is displayed alongside former stable-mate Norfolk & Western 611 at the Virginia Museum of Transportation, where they are the star attractions in the museum's Claytor Pavilion. It has been cosmetically restored, though not operational, since the overhaul started in 1992 was never completed. Although the undertaking would be considerable, she is very capable of being returned to operation, with the uncompleted boiler and firebox repairs being the primary scope of work remaining from her aborted overhaul. No. 1218 does get out a bit, on rare occasions. In 2007, Norfolk Southern pulled it (cold), with 611, to its Roanoke Shops for the shops' 125th anniversary celebration.

References

• Jeffries, Lewis I., N&W: Giant of Steam (Rev. ed. 2005).
• Wrinn, Jim, Steam's Camelot: Southern and Norfolk Southern Excursions in Color (2000).
• Chappell, Gordon, Steam Over Scranton: The Locomotives of Steamtown (1991)

External links

• picture of N&W 1218 pulling an excursion train in 1988
• side view of N&W 1218 under steam in 1987