p. NSW Hill Climbers

28th May 2007

The colonists at Botany Bay found themselves surrounded by an escarpment so steep that it took 25 years to find a way across. The railway later followed this route over the Blue Mountains, necessitating long gradients of 1 in 30. South of Sydney it was the same story climbing the Southern Highlands (actually the rim of the same escarpment). Once over these obstacles, the Great Dividing Range stretches from Victoria to Queensland, and while not at all remarkable as mountains go, the funds available to the small population would only stretch to basic railways with minimal earthworks. So in every direction, the main lines extended for hundreds of miles with long climbs of 1 in 40 being the rule, not the exception. Some attempts were later made to ease some of these headaches, but there was never enough money to make a significant difference. The NSWGR therefore needed locomotives capable of sustained climbing on some of the world’s worst mainline gradients, but the track and bridges could not support heavy engines with high adhesive weight. For some decades standard British and American locomotives were imported, but none were ideal. The problem was solved by William Thow, the NSWGR Chief Mechanical Engineer. Headhunted from the South Australian Railways, and originally a London & North Western man, he had the Leeds firm of Dubs build a 4-6-0 to conquer the Adelaide Hills. The “R” class was among the first of its type built in Britain, and he followed with the even bigger “P6” class 4-6-0 for NSW, still in advance of the "Jones Goods" of the Highland Railway in Scotland. The firm of Beyer Peacock provided design assistance, and built them in their Manchester works. Soon Thow had them working on the “T” class 2-8-0, probably the first “Consolidation" type made in Britain, and seven years in advance of Churchward’s 2-8-0 for the GWR. Nearly 800 hill climbing 4-6-0’s and 2-8-0’s to Thow’s basic design were working in NSW by the early 1920’s, and most continued into the Sixties. They were uncomplicated, rugged and easy to maintain, with big boilers to satisfy the high steam demands.
Ironically, although South Australia lost Thow to NSW, his 4-6-0 and 2-8-0 were chosen for the trans-continental railway across the Nullabor, albeit with bigger tenders. The hill climbing “P” also managed a heavy express all by itself at the moderate speeds permitted on the lightly ballasted desert track.
This collection of steam in country NSW includes some of Thow’s engines (reclassified as the C32, D50, D53 and D55 classes), together with some by his successors, E.E.Lucy and Harold Young. They borrowed from British and American practice, but their products were not copies!

Ride Of A Lifetime	Steam Heat And Skis	Thow's Trademark	Breather At Summit Tank
Day Of Glory	Successful Formula	Labour Saving At Binnaway	Southern Hemisphere Southern
Built For It	Spot The Difference?	Unsynchronized	Cold Pies
First Good Look	Mr Lucy's Pig	Who's Hungry?	No Slacking
Oiling Around	Dubbo Today, Forbes Tomorrow	Hard Work Ahead