The War Department (WD) "Austerity" 2-8-0 was a heavy freight locomotive that was introduced in 1943 for service during WW2. A total of 935 were built by the North British Locomotive Company and the Vulcan Foundry and all but 3 of them saw service with the British Army in mainland Europe after D-Day.
After the Second World War 200 of them were sold to the LNER and in 1948 533 more were purchased by the British Transport Commission for use by the newly formed British Railways. The 733 locomotives were renumbered 90000–90732 and were used almost entirely on freight services. Well over half the total number were always on the former LNER system, from East Anglia up to Scotland, and there was also a large number across the former Lancashire & Yorkshire railway depots. Some were initially used on the Southern Region, but later left there, while another smaller group was on the Western Region for much of their lives. The Scottish ones later spread from just the ex-LNER lines across the rest of the Region.
In 1946, 12 were exported to the British colony of Hong Kong to work the Kowloon-Canton Railway. Six were scrapped in 1956, but the final two survived until September 1962.
The other 184 locomotives remained in mainland Europe, mostly working in and around the Netherlands for Nederlandse Spoorwegen.
Finally, one went to the USATC in an exchange for a USATC S160 Class locomotive (
that sounds familiar!) in the Postwar locomotive exchanges.
By the end of steam in Britain in 1967, 123 WD 2-8-0's were still in service however none of these were preserved. Fortunately one of the 935 engines has survived; WD No. 79257. This was returned to Britain via the Netherlands and Sweden and has been restored to original condition and given the BR number 90733.
The Victory Works model will be packed with features and options and will cover many of the variations and liveries that this class carried.
And yes, later on we will be making the 2-10-0 version as well!
So you know the drill by now, we always start with the wheels. These were rather fun to model having a really unusual and interesting design.
Frames and the basic boiler shape.
Cylinders (at a slightly jaunty angle!) and all of that lovely Walschaerts gear that will churn back and forth as she runs along.
And finally a quick video. Yes this loco will have fully animated gear as you move the reverser.
Note: Apologies to the purists that in the video the gear works backwards - it should be lowered for forwards with inside admission! This will obviously not be the case when we release it, this set up was to make sure we could integrate all the parts properly)
We'll be back next week with more modelling.
