GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

Acocks Green & South Yardley Station: gwrag1071

GWR 4-2-2 'Achilles class' No 3050 'Royal Sovereign' is seen standing on the down relief line at the head of a Birmingham bound train. Built at Swindon in February 1895 it remained in service until December 1915 when it was withdrawn from service. The first locomotives of this class were built between April and August 1891 as eight broad gauge convertible 2 - 2 - 2 engines, No 3021 to No 3028, and ran in this configuration until the end of Broad Gauge working in May 1892. Another 22 locomotives were built as standard gauge 2 - 2 - 2's in late 1891 and early 1982, No 3029 to No 3030 and No 3001 to No 3020, with No 3021 No 3028 being converted to standard gauge in mid-1892. With a driving wheel of 7 feet 8½ inches, the boiler diameter was restricted to just 4 feet 3 inches, which required a boiler length of 11 feet 6 inches in order to provide sufficient heating surfaces for efficient steaming. With this barrel length, the engines were very heavy on the leading wheels and unsteady at speed. Unfortunately, on the 16th of September 1893, the leading axle of No 3021 'Wigmore Castle' broke inside Box Tunnel causing the train to derail. Between March and December 1894, all thirty members had their frames lengthened to accommodate a leading bogie altering the design to a 4 - 2 - 2 configuration.

In addition the cylinder diameter was reduced from 20 to 19 inches, decreasing the tractive effort from 14,115 to 12,200 pounds. The underhung trailing springs were at first retained on the rebuilds until transfer above the platform occurred between 1895 and 1897. As 'Wigmore Castle' was being rebuilt, the first locomotive to be built new as a 4 - 2 - 2, No 3031 'Achilles' was also outshopped. The class were then officially known as the 3031 Achilles class, but are frequently known as the 3001 class or 'Dean Singles'. The rest of the class appeared in batches until the last, number 3080 'Windsor Castle', was delivered in March 1899. This was the period when George Churchward was experimenting with various boiler and firebox designs. The first alteration concerned the clackboxes that feed water to the boiler. A complete absence of clackboxes favoured by Dean on the initial engines was soon replaced by enormous brass mountings on the side of the barrel. In turn, these were superseded in 1898 by a much smaller mounting with a vertical feed pipe which gave way to a hidden feed to the bottom of the barrel. In the same year, in common with many classes, thicker tyres were introduced increasing the wheel diameters to 4 feet 1½ inches bogie, 7 feet 9 inches driver and 4 feet 7½ inches trailing. Courtesy 'Great Western Archive'.

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