re: Railfans of the OT... Union Pacific bringing steam locomotive "Big Boy" 4014 to Louisiana

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I'm completely ignorant to trains, can you explain why I should walk a block to go see this thing

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rolling history

UP refurbished 4014 to take part in the celebration of 150 year anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad

ETA: also... it's just a fricking huge piece of mechanical mastery

FWIW... 4014 was originally built in November 1941

quote:

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I'm completely ignorant to trains, can you explain why I should walk a block to go see this thing

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It's the largest steam locomotive ever built. It's basically two steam locomotives in one, a "mallet" design. It's 4-8-8-4 wheel arrangement indicates that. It has 2 sets of training wheels in front, two sets of 4 drivers and 2 sets of trailing wheels. It's so big, it's articulated, meaning it can bend in the middle to go around curves. A total of 25 were ever built, 8 still survive and the 4014 is the only one that is operational. Union pacific rebuilt it from the ground up, spending over $5 million on the restoration.

It was designed to pull 100 car trains across the high plains and mountain passes of the American west at 70+ mph. Originally slated to be called the Wasatch class, for the Utah mountains east of Salt Lake one of the workers building them wrote "Big Boy" on the front of the boiler and the name stuck. During WWII when German spies reported "super trains" that could pull freight over the rocky mountains at 80 mph, the Germans back in the motherland thought it impossible.

When we saw it, I thought some that big shouldn't be able to move that fast on steam alone.

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