Weighing in at 1.1 million pounds and measuring nearly half a football field in length, the “Big Boy” locomotives were designed to haul heavy freight for the Union Pacific railroad over the mountainous regions of Utah and Wyoming.
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(KMTV) — Fans from all over the country come to the Men's College World Series, but some folks come from just as far to see the temporary attraction parked across the street. They are here to see the Union Pacific's Big Boy.” It is a 1.1-million-pound steam locomotive that is the world's largest in operation.
Therefore I say it was and is the largest steam engine that was ever created... There was a machine called the Allegheny type which I think was a 4-6-6-6 which some believe was actually more powerfull and heavier than the Big Boy.
Of the eight remaining Big Boys in existence, No.4014 is the only one operating today. The Big Boys were about 133 feet long and weigh 1.2 million pounds. Because of their great length, the frames of the Big Boys are “hinged,” or articulated, to allow them to negotiate curves.
Union Pacific reached out to EMD for more power, and the result was the behemoth EMD DDA40X. Often cited as both the largest and most powerful diesel-electric locomotive ever built, the 98-foot, 5-inch, 475,830-pound machine is staggering. The prime movers are a pair of EMD 16-645E3A diesels.
The Big Boys were built for power. They did the work of three smaller engines, pulling 120-car, 3800 ton freight trains at forty miles per hour in the mountains of Utah and Wyoming. With power, though, comes weight - larger cylinders, pistons, drive rods, boiler and firebox.
Its girth requires a 4-8-8-4 wheel configuration to keep it rock-steady on the rails. With a puny 7,000 horsepower, Big Boys had a maximum tractive power of 135,375 pounds, all to pull huge loads of freight across steep grades in Utah's Wasatch Mountains and the Rockies.
One of the most beautiful steam locomotives ever built, the S1 was designed by Raymond Loewe. Poor balancing caused wheel-spin and only one was ever built, for the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1939.
Union Pacific 4014 is a steam locomotive owned and operated by the Union Pacific (UP) as part of its heritage fleet. It is a four-cylinder simple articulated 4-8-8-4 Big Boy type built in 1941 by the American Locomotive Company (ALCO) at its Schenectady Locomotive Works.
The class J-1 and J-3a Hudsons of 1927 had 79 inch drivers. They were fast, powerful, very well proportioned, good looking, and may have been the best known steam locomotive. Honorable Mentions: CMStP&P Class F7.