The GER Class D81 was a class of twenty-five

0-6-0 Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, represents the wheel arrangement of no leading wheels, six powered and coupled driving wheels on three axles and no trailing wheels. This was the most common wheel arrangemen ...

steam locomotives designed by A. J. Hill for the

Great Eastern Railway The Great Eastern Railway (GER) was a pre-grouping British railway company, whose main line linked London Liverpool Street to Norwich and which had other lines through East Anglia. The company was grouped into the London and North Eastern R ...

. The all passed to the

London and North Eastern Railway The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) was the second largest (after LMS) of the " Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain. It operated from 1 January 1923 until nationalisation on 1 January 1948. At th ...

at the

1923 grouping The Railways Act 1921 (c. 55), also known as the Grouping Act, was an Act of Parliament enacted by the British government and intended to stem the losses being made by many of the country's 120 railway companies, by "grouping" them into four la ...

and received the classification J20.

History

These locomotives were fitted with cylinders and wheels, while the

Belpaire firebox The Belpaire firebox is a type of firebox used on steam locomotives. It was invented by Alfred Belpaire of Belgium in 1864. Today it generally refers to the shape of the outer shell of the firebox which is approximately flat at the top and squa ...

-fitted boiler was identical to that fitted to the Class S69 4-6-0s. They were the most powerful 0-6-0 tender locomotive in Britain until the arrival of

Oliver Bulleid Oliver Vaughan Snell Bulleid Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE (19 September 1882 – 25 April 1970) was a British railway and mechanical engineer best known as the Chief Mechanical Engineer (CME) of the Southern Railway ( ...

's Q1 class for the Southern Railway in 1942. All were still in service at the 1923 grouping, the LNER adding 7000 to the numbers of nearly all the ex-Great Eastern locomotives, including the Class D81 locomotives. Between 1943 and 1956 the class was rebuilt with round-top fireboxes, and reclassified as J20/1. At nationalisation in 1948,

British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British rai ...

added 60000 to their LNER numbers. They all continued in service until 1959, when the first was withdrawn; all were gone by the end of 1962.

References

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External links

– Great Eastern Railway Society
The Hill J20 (GER Class D81) 0-6-0 Locomotives
– LNER Encyclopedia {{LNER Locomotives Great Eastern Railway locomotives, D81 0-6-0 locomotives Railway locomotives introduced in 1920 Standard gauge steam locomotives of Great Britain Freight locomotives