The Great Central Railway (GCR) Class 9A was a class of

0-6-2T T, or t, is the twentieth Letter (alphabet), letter in the English language, modern English English alphabet, alphabet and the ISO basic Latin alphabet. Its name in English is English alphabet#Letter names, ''tee'' (pronounced ), plural ''te ...

steam locomotive A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...

built between 1889 and 1892. From 1923 the locomotives were redesignated Class N4.

Design and construction

Designed by Thomas Parker for the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (MS&LR), a total of 55 locomotives were constructed up to 1892. The MS&LR changed its name to the GCR in 1897. In 1892 the final fourteen locomotives were built with a larger coal bunker, increasing their weight to . This last batch was classified as Class 9A Altered, sometimes abbreviated as 9A Alt. The GCR 9A locos were reclassified as N4 under the

LNER locomotive numbering and classification A number of different numbering and classification schemes were used for the locomotives owned by the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) and its constituent companies. This page explains the principal systems that were used. The following a ...

system when the GCR was absorbed into 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 ...

after 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 ...

. The original design were N4/1 and those with extended bunkers N4/2. In 1925, shorter chimneys began to be fitted to bring the N4s within the LNER composite loading gauge, creating two further variants N4/2 (short bunker) – the existing N4/2s being recoded as N4/3s – and N4/4 (long bunker).

Locomotive numbering

They were built in three batches and numbered 161, 165, 173 (later renumbered 512–514), 601–638, and 712–725. GCR locos had 5000 added to their original numbers when the line was absorbed by the LNER in 1923, resulting in numbers ranging between 5512 and 5725. As part of the LNER's numbering rationalisation scheme introduced in 1946, the surviving 22 N4s were renumbered between 9225 and 9247 with the earliest built receiving the lowest number, and so on. British Railways, formed on 1 January 1948, added 60000 to all LNER loco numbers.

References

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External links

LNER encyclopedia
{{DEFAULTSORT:GCR Class 09A 09A 0-6-2T locomotives Railway locomotives introduced in 1889 Neilson locomotives Scrapped locomotives Standard gauge steam locomotives of Great Britain