SPUR 1 BR 52k

[Georgeconna]

Hi Lads,

Just seen this on utube, Absolutely amazing Model, the Features on this a nuts, Reserving Gear works, chimney cap rotates, Tender flap opens, smoke out of Safety and whistle and cylinders Any one know any thing about it I imagine it is a condenser on the back?

Let down by a crappy chuff sound though.

Anyone know any history of this loco, I've had a look on the net and cannie find anything.

heading off to do the lotto now I think.

 

 

Edited October 10, 2020 by Georgeconna

[Horsetan]

Yes, these were the German Br.52 Kriegsloks equipped with condensing tenders and equipment for service on the Eastern Front, as Hitler invaded the Soviet Union.

Some survived after the war, being used as stationary steam engines, especially in the now former East Germany. 

One 52.Kon was taken by the US Army back to the US with a few other Reichsbahn engines (including the unique streamliner 19.1001) for further study and display,  before being cut up for scrap when there was no further use for them.

[Georgeconna]

Tks Horse

 

Discovered a bit more now!

 

in the first half of the 1940s, a large number of class 52 locomotives of the Deutsche Reichsbahn were equipped with condenser tenders. They were initially used in war zones east of Germany, later also in northern France and Belgium. Due to the lack of a steam plume, they were not so easily noticed by the crews of enemy aircraft and could also be used in areas where the infrastructure for the intake of feed water was no longer available due to destruction. After the war , some machines of the 52 series were konstationed in the Mainz-Bischofsheim depot. In 1950 there were 16 locomotives with the numbers 1853z, 1862, 1907, 1919, 1935, 1941, 1957, 1987z, 1997, 2001, 2005, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2024z; other machines were stationed in Kirchweyhe, Duisburg-Wedau, Rosenheim, Munich-Ost and -HBf and Nördlingen, but were parked until mid-1954. In the area of what was later to become the GDR, 25 machines remained, which were used in the Cottbus area and converted into the normal version while retaining their company number. In Germany, the tender of 52 has been preserved in 1972 (source: Kondenslok.de), but no matching locomotive.

[Horsetan]

After the divided Germany gradually rebuilt post-war, there was a decreasing need for the condensing 52s. Their great length also counted against them.

As for the engines taken to America, it looks like they were primarily war trophies, and thus wasted on the Yanks as very little of the technology was used by American railroads. As far as I understand it, they had all been scrapped by about 1952.

[Georgeconna]

Yes I seen that in the Video it stretched way over the turntable, not good for a loco, Interesting never the less. 

[DiveController]

Fantastic!

 I have new expectations for IRM's 800 Class

[Mayner]

South African Railways operated 90 Class 25 4-8-4 condensing locomotives for use in arid regions such as the Karo the condensing apparatus and condensing tender was designed by Henschel and is likely to have been based on war time experience with the condensing Kreigslocks.

The South Africans rebuilt the majority of the class as conventional locomotives (mainly to reduce maintenance costs) during the 1970s, the rebuilt tenders lost their condensing gear and were nicknamed Worshond Afrikaans for Daschund or literally sausage dog.

Some steam can be seen escaping from the tender at 4:54.