Garratt Articulated Locomotives

You have sourced some terrific photos for this video! Just one important point. You didn’t mention that Garratts were used extensively across Australia on 2’, 2’6”, 3’6” and 4’8.5” gauge. The very first Garratts used anywhere in the world were introduced in Australia in 1909, and some of the latest huge double 4-8-4 versions were still in service in the early 1970s. Many were imported to Oz, but local manufacturers also built them here. Some of your technical drawings were in fact of various Australian Garratt locos, including the very last one.

If Americans adopted the Garrett , big boyy would have been known as small boy.😊

I fired the GMAM and Gf garrets out of Masons mill depot in Pietermaritzburg. It was the good old days It has a unique beat

Sunday River Productions used to sell a film about the GMA Garretts called "Bigger than Big Boy", with the explanation that if built to standard gauge dimensions rather than 3'6" gauge, this would have been larger than the Union Pacific 4-8-8-4s and therefore the biggest locomotives in the world. As steam locomotives go they are still big, and can hold their own against many decent sized standard gauge engines.

I remember looking down on Garratts from an overpass in the mid 1960s on the Newcastle (NSW) to Wallangarra (Qld.) line

I think the largest Garratt locomotive ever built was the "YA-01" built by Beyer Peacock for the USSR.

60 class Garrets ran in NSW Australia. Pretty large units. My uncle hated driving them as you were cooked going through tunnels, he preferred 57,58 & 59 class loco’s. He drove the western line from Sydney to parks and everywhere in between.

Saw one in a railyard in Nairobi kenya years ago. Not steamed unfortunately. There is one in the Manchester science museum , which has an an automatic stoker to feed the coal into the firebox from the tender. Fascinating piece of kit. Apparently they were often used on narrow gauge railways where they needed good pulling power but with the weight distribution for light tracks .

The locomotives belonging to this class are true beasts, and a magnificent example of design, engineering, and manufacturing. Thank you for this very detailed examination of these wonderful machines. 🚂

@6:09 , the Green 4-8-0 0-8-4 Garratt marked B N R is a Bengal Nagpur Railway locomotive from the Railway Museum in New Delhi. That was a pre-Independence Private Railway used to pull lignite and other ore cars. Considered the most powerful steam locomotive in India since all others were mostly non articulated Pacific and Mikado types. The Museum had some very rare Locomotives but they were not used in large numbers, like the Garratts.

As another respondent has said, the Welsh Highland Railway operate ex-South African Railways Beyer-Garretts on the 2 foot gauge, and what magnificent machines they are too ! Well worth a visit to North Wales to see them in action. They share the station at Portmadoc with the Ffestiniog Railway which also have some very interesting engines built to the Fairlie design principal, being also articulated, with two boilers and the cab in the middle !

We had some of these in England (LMS 2-6-0+0-6-2, and LNER 2-8-0+0-8-2 (6 cylinders)).

The first Beyer-Garratt was a 2-foot 0-4-0+0-4-0 compound for use on a logging railroad on Australia's island of Tazmania in 1909. The cylinders were reversed to be toward the center of the loco. It was numbered K1 and its sister, ordered a few years later, was numbered K2. They both survived until dieselization and the operation closed in the 1950s. The K1 was shipped back to the UK, rebuilt, then went to the Welsh Highland Ry where it is in occasional use along with several SAR 2-6-2+2-6-2 Garratts built for the SAR 2-ft branches in the 1960s(the last Garratts built) because of the pulling power with low axle loads on the sharp curves(150-foot radius) and grades of the branches. A Houston oilman bought a NGG16 2-6-2+2-6-2 and several cars to be shipped to close to Houston but I haven't seen where they have been put into service. This would be the only Garratt in the US other than models. Garratts were built for gauges from 2 feet to 5 feet 6 inches and 0-4-0+0-4-0 to 4-8-4+4-8-4. They were mostly used where British companies had investments and operated railroads other than Canada and the USA.

You may like to read the specifications of the AD-60 class Garratt locomotive of the New South Wales Railways in Australia that you used at the end of your video at 12:35. These engines were one of the most powerful Garratts built and were used on lightly built lines to haul heavy freight trains. Love your videos.

I love the aesthetic of Garratts.

Pronounce Pietermaritzburg as Peter Maritz (the person's name) Burg (city) and you've got the sound correct. Now speed it up to one flowing word Pietermaritzburg.

Another great video, thank you. It is interesting how certain designs were preferred by the various railways. In South Africa, the mallet-types were not successful and all were scrapped and as you point out, in the US, the garrett is non-existent. The "mother" of the GMAM - the Class GM was so successful on the Krugersdorp - Zeerust line that it prevented the line from being electrified (to this day it is still unelectrified and serviced by diesel locos).

Interesting technology. Very unique. I'm surprised to find that Germany was able to build and export such massive locomotives only 8 years after the end of the war. Lots of good hard work and determination. Bravo!

Great stuff . Thanks. Dave

Untill now i had never heard about this type of loco Thanks for a good video