Steam & Excursion > Now THAT is a Tender!

Thought I'd share something I found as I was browsing through Alvin Staufer's "B&O Power" book. This is a picture of a Q3 Mikado with what I believe is the biggest tender *I've* ever seen on an engine. It says it was off of an EL-5 2-8-8-0. And I thought Pennsys Coast-to-Coast tenders were huge!

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From what I can find online, those tenders held 22000 gallons of water and 23 tons of coal, which is more water but less coal than PRR's "coast to coast" tender (21000 gallons and 29.9 tons).  The tanks behind Santa Fe's 2900- and 3776-class 4-8-4's and 5011-class 2-10-4's were even bigger: 24500 gallons of water, 7000 gallons of oil.  The centipede tenders behind UP's Big Boys had to be tall and compact rather than long and lanky given the already extraordinary length of the locomotives they served, but the tenders that came with the second order nevertheless held a whopping 25000 gallons of water and 28 tons of coal.

Here's one of those big B&O tenders behind a 4-8-2:

http://www.3rdrail.com/images/bot3vandy.jpg

That photo is pretty late in the game for steam on the B&O, too -- the locomotive has a 3-digit number. The Frisco box with the billboard slogan is nice.

I assume those big tender combo's were too long for a turntable. Some wye's must have been available wherever they ran.

Hmmm, at first glance I figured this was one of Hogheaded's photoshop jobs...

Guess we can't blame this one on him!

S_W

The capacity isn't out of line with even, say the NKP Berks or a Wabash M-1, 4-8-2. I'd be curious to see what the length is.

​Victor A. Baird
​http://www.erstwhilepublications.com



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/28/16 09:47 by wabash2800.

Must have taken a really stout frame to take that load with the span between the trucks!!

I have seen photos and video of similar sized B&O tenders behind locomotives on the Sand Patch grade, but the tenders that I am remembering had a third truck, half way between the forward and rear trucks.  I just came up empty searching the internet for a photo of one of these three-trucked tenders.....anybody know where a photo of one of them can be found?

Evan_Werkema Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> From what I can find online, those tenders held
> 22000 gallons of water and 23 tons of coal, which
> is more water but less coal than PRR's "coast to
> coast" tender (21000 gallons and 29.9 tons).  The
> tanks behind Santa Fe's 2900- and 3776-class
> 4-8-4's and 5011-class 2-10-4's were even bigger:
> 24500 gallons of water, 7000 gallons of oil.  The
> centipede tenders behind UP's Big Boys had to be
> tall and compact rather than long and lanky given
> the already extraordinary length of the
> locomotives they served, but the tenders that came
> with the second order nevertheless held a whopping
> 25000 gallons of water and 28 tons of coal.
>
> Here's one of those big B&O tenders behind a
> 4-8-2:
>
> http://www.3rdrail.com/images/bot3vandy.jpg

And those Santa Fe tenders rode on 4 axle trucks too!

     I finally found some info on the internet on the three-truck B&O tender that I mentioned.  Info is from the book "Definitive History of B&O Q-class Locomotives".  B&O built this one experimental three-truck tender in 1929, taking a 18-A tender tank plus a 27-A tender frame and extending them by 19-feet.  They placed this 20,000-gallon tender on three trucks, the two outer being Andrews tender trucks, and the center one being a 4-wheeled locomotive lead truck, mounted midway between the other two.  The tender was mated to 2-8-2 #4468.
     The three trucks under the tender suffered from several problems, causing the tender's return to the shop.  The three trucks were replaced by three Vulcan freight trucks.  In late 1929, the reworked tender was mated to "an articulated locomotive" (2-8-8-0 ?, #?)  End of information.    

Also photos in B&O Power.

Doug Wetherhold
Macungie, PA

lynnpowell Wrote:

>      I finally found some info on the internet
> on the three-truck B&O tender that I mentioned. 

Photo and drawing scanned out of a magazine are a little ways down on this page:

http://sbiii.com/rr2.html#b&o-c&o

Clipped photo of the tender behind 2-8-8-0 #7109 is here:

http://www.northeast.railfan.net/images/bo7109s.jpg

The tender 7109 came with was somewhat smaller:

http://www.northeast.railfan.net/images/bo7109sa.jpg