James Holden 0-10-0T No. 20 'Decapod' + GER Class P43

I have added a couple of photos of James Holden locos, now long gone
The Decapod was the first ten-coupled locomotive to run in the UK

In the early 1900s, the Great Eastern Railway (GER) was threatened by the City & North Eastern Surburban Electric Railway - a scheme for an electric railway which would compete with the GER's lucrative commuter traffic. In order stop this proposal in Parliament, the GER's Management ordered James Holden to produce a locomotive that could compete with an electric railway. The locomotive had to accelerate a 300 ton train to 30mph in 30 seconds. The 0-10-0T No. 20 'Decapod' was Holden's response to this challenge. In tests, the Decapod appears to have met the acceleration goal, and the electric scheme was defeated.

20 0-10-0T No. 20 'Decapod'

https://railway-photography.smugmug.com/LNERSteam/Holden-Locomotives/James-Holden-Assorted-designs/i-FCF4qpf

+

The GER Class P43 was a class of ten 4-2-2 steam tender locomotives designed by James Holden for the Great Eastern Railway. They were the last 'singles' built for the Great Eastern, and the last in service.

19 J.Holden GER Class P43 built 1898, scrapped 1909

https://railway-photography.smugmug.com/LNERSteam/Holden-Locomotives/James-Holden-Assorted-designs/i-rXszqts



Neil

 

The Decapod has always had a fasciation of it's own but I have not been able to find much about the water capacity and supply. How much water was carried and what would have been the distance between refills?

 

I'm guessing it must have been a well tank, as there are no side tanks.

I've read something of this loco, many years ago, and it was probably either a Nock or Tuplin book, or an old edition of the Railway Magazine. The County Library in Stafford had a more or less complete bound set of them.

My memories of what I read are that the loco was not seriously intended to be a practical propoposition, and was quite a heavy beast, likely to cause damage to the track, so I've no doubt that water and coal capacities were not given a high priority.

Edit: Just found this wiki article, not sure how reliable the information is. It suggests 2 tons of coal and 1300 gallons of water, not that different to say, a GWR pannier, so given its much higher power, it would be stopping for water at more or less every station

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GER_Class_A55

 

I take it that the 0-10-0T was never used in service?

 

Yes, it was a well tank. The engine was built purely to prove a point and, as @neildimmer say's, it was highly successful for that purpose. It was rebuilt as an 0-8-0 tender engine, though the "rebuild" was more of a book-keeping achievement than a practical one. The boilers were obviously different and I have seen a photo, in a GER Society Journal, which shows the partly-dismantled 0-10-0T alongside the "new" 0-8-0, both carrying cylinders, so neither they nor the frames were reused

 

Thanks for that, I too thought that it should be a well tank but with 3 cylinders, inside motion and a wide firebox I am not sure where you would find space. But with that boiler and acceleration it would take 30 seconds to 30mph, 5 minutes between stations and a 5 minute fill at every other station. No wonder the idea was not taken serioulsy.

 

Be a hell of a lot more fun than a modern EMU though!

 

IIRC, I am sure I read somewhere that it only ever ran once to prove it worked.

 

Just about anything would be more fun than a GER 'Dusty Bin'