The O
B class was the first class of
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 loco ...
s constructed by the
Baldwin Locomotive Works
The Baldwin Locomotive Works (BLW) was an American manufacturer of railroad locomotives from 1825 to 1951. Originally located in Philadelphia, it moved to nearby Eddystone, Pennsylvania, in the early 20th century. The company was for decades ...
for the
Wellington and Manawatu Railway Company
The Wellington and Manawatu Railway Company (WMR or W&MR) was a private railway company that built, owned and operated the Wellington-Manawatu railway line between Thorndon in Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, and Longburn, near Palmers ...
(WMR) in
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island coun ...
. The class consisted of two locomotives ordered in 1888, and they entered service in September of that year as WMR No.'s 11 and 12.
When the WMR and its locomotive fleet was acquired by the government and merged into the national
New Zealand Railways (NZR) in 1908, the two locomotives were considered to be similar to the
O class but with enough differences to warrant the separate O
B classification. No. 11 became O
B 455 and No. 12 became O
B 456, and they ended their days working around
Napier. O
B 456 was retired in September 1929, and was followed in March 1931 by O
B 455, which had survived to be one of the final operating locomotives of WMR heritage, along with
NC 461 and
UD 465, both of which were withdrawn in the same month.
External links
New Zealand Steam locomotives — OB class
Notes
References
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Ob class
2-8-0 locomotives
Baldwin locomotives
Scrapped locomotives
Railway locomotives introduced in 1888
3 ft 6 in gauge locomotives of New Zealand
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