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yankeedog — PRR S1 6100 Duplex
Published: 2006-04-30 15:22:46 +0000 UTC; Views: 7018; Favourites: 110; Downloads: 67
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Pennsylvania Railroad S1 No. 6100 was the darling of the 1939 Chicago World's Fair. Her tender was lettered "American Railroads", she represented the latest development in steam power and design. Built at Juniata Shops in Altoona, Pennsylvania, she was the biggest locomotive in the world! Some will argue, that the Union Pacific "Big Boy" freight locomotive was the bigger, but the S1 was 140' 2.5" stem to stern, the Big Boy was only 137' long. Although not as successful as the UP Big Boy, she was certainly the most beautiful of the two with her sleek Raymond Loewy streamlined styling. Built for high speed passenger service, with a 6-4-4-6 wheel arraignment, she was powered by four huge 22" cylinders with a 26" stroke and a steam pressure of 300 pounds per inch to drive her eight 84 inch driving wheels! She was built to travel at speeds of 100 mph+ with a full consist of heavy weight pullman cars. Weighing in at 1,0006,010 lbs, the S1 could more than handle any train! The S1 was so big she could only operate on lines west of Pittsburgh on the flats of Ohio and Indiana were she could really stretch her long legs. Crestline, Ohio was the place that she called home. Rumor had it that she was a bit slippery, but in the hands of a good engineer, she was more than capable of pulling all the Pennsy's named passenger trains west of Pittsburgh. Valuable information was learned with the S1 and that was later incorporated into T1 [link] [link] Sadly the S1 was scrapped by the railroad in 1949. Complicated, difficult to work on and too large to operate over most of the Pennsylvania System helped spell her demise. The S1 was just over the top too much! I guess big isn't always better.Adobe Illustrator 8.0, Apple G4 Power Mac, OS 9.2
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Comments: 47
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This thing is a classic BEAST! She is a very handsome engine, and the streamlining makes her a strange shape that pleases the eye!
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The T-1 was moderately successful, but the timing was bad. American railroads were starting to dieselize and these locomotive required a whole lot of maintenance. They were fast and saw a lot of use from Pittsburgh to points West. A T1 on the Fort Wayne Division was reported to have exceeded 125 mph! The C&O did some testing on one and were very pleased with the T1, but in the hands of an inexperienced or unskilled engineers, the T1 was slippery and difficult, prone to wheel slip and valve damage.
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the tyrone libary is in danger of closing because of lack of funds please help if possible
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Had to fav! I have this one one my railroad.
[link]
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Thanks! It's a shame this historic locomotive wasn't preserved.
-YD
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The Penssy S-1 is one of my favorite standard gauge locos, if not my favorite. Even if it was deemed a failer. Also, this picture is probably my favorite artwork done of the S-1. Epic win and insta-fav (just thought I'd through in some useless internet cliches). Great work.
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Thanks! One of my favs too! The S-1 was an enigma. It combined all the best that the Pennsy design department had to offer, but none of the "Standard" elements that made the Pennsylvania Railroad great. The Pennsy was noted for practical efficient designs that were so thoroughly tested at the Juniata shops, that by the time a new design hit the rails, it was Fait accompli. The S-1 was a dream machine and more of a testbed of unproven impractical technology that didn't match up with the infrastructure of most of the PRR. It could only be run West of Altoona and was more in it's element on the long flats of Ohio. It couldn't roam the system end to end and was relegated to Crestline. The S-1 was the Pennsy flexing it's design muscles for the 1939 Chicago World's fair and had no practical use other than an successful exhibit, but WOW what an exhibit!
-YD
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Completely true on all acounts, if only Pennsy had updated their railway a little, perhaps with straighter track, we could have seen more S-1 on more lines, or even an improvement (not including the T-1). It was slightly wasted on that treadmill at the fair, but hey, it was running. Streamlined steam is so awesome, and probably the reason I love the S-1 so much is because 1) it was very radical in science and design 2) it was the only one of its kind to be built and 3) it had a very unique wheel arrangement 6-4-4-6. Something about having six wheels that are not the driving wheels just gets to me, since most locos had 2 or 4 leading and trailing wheels. Another one of my favorites is the Allegheny which is 2-6-6-6. It's just unique. So anyway, great artwork.
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It was futuristic design. That era before WWII was a time of great innovation and design, it seemed that the future was bright and that anything was possible, the S-1 epitomized that, Raymond Loewy was such a brilliant designer, the S-1, the T-1, the GG-1 and the streamlined K-4s, he gave the Pennys a look that put them light years ahead of the New York Central with it's thermos bottle and upside down bath tubs.
It's really a shame that the S-1 and at least on T-1 couldn't have been saved.
The Allegheny types were awesome machines. Did you see this? [link]
-YD
-YD
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So true, but I haven't heard of the GG-1. I'll have to look that up. Another of my favorite Pennsy duplexes are the Q-1 and Q-2.
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The GG-1 was Pennys famed electric locomotives that operated on the Northeast Corridor and to Harrisburg, PA. They saved a lot of them, there are ones at the B&O Museum, Strasburg at Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, at Harrisburg, I think there are several at other museums around the country. I think there's one at the Illinois Central Museum. [link]
The Qs were cool [link]
-YD
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Ya, as soon as I sent that last message, I realised the GG-1 wasn't steam. If only they had saved more steam engines like they did with these electrics. Anyway, thanks for the info.
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LOL! Yeah, the GG-1 wasn't steam. I think the Pennsy should have save one of each class. There's a nice collection out at Strasburg , PA, with a K-4, an M-1, an E-7 and several other 4-4-2s, a 4-6-0, an 0-6-0, an 0-4-0...
-YD
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Ya, it's great that they saved those, but it would have been great if they had saved the duplexes. O well, just leaves another piece of history to be replicated, hopefully.
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I don't understand what they were thinking. There was a growing collection of Pennsy steam locomotives at Northumberland Roundhouse. For some reason they were stashing locomotives away, but there didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it, some of the locomotives had historic connection like 7002 and 460, but the rest seemed to arbitrary. One would think that if you were making a historic collection, there would be some plan. I'm thankful that they saved what they saved, but there should have been more.
-YD
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So true. It's sad to see an engines only worth is the amount of scrap metal businessmen can rip off of it.
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There is a scrap yard at the north end of Sharpsburg Yard on the PRR's Conemagh Division north of Pittsburgh where they scrapped a lot of the T-1 fleet that operated out of Pittsburgh. 31st Street Yard in Pittsburgh was the main stomping grounds for the T-1s back in the day and Sharpsburg is only a few miles away, so I guess it was logical to scrap them there. A friend of mine worked at the scrap yard in the 1970's and 80's, I had always hoped that he might find some T-1 relic, but he never did, he did give me a builders plate from a Bucyrus Railroad Crane that he literly tripped over on his way to lunch one day, it was half buried in the dirt. I took it and had is sand blasted and repainted it, it's really cool.
-YD
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as always you astound me with your designs, i love both of these train ones. the colors, gradients and lay out has such an amazing standard to them, very art deco looking.
Buzz -
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Thanks Buzz! That's the beauty of doing a series.
-YD
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Very nice work! I really like streamlined steam locomotives, and specially if they are fast!
Ahmed Nayyer
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Sweet! I really like this! Love the lines and angles on this train. Nice work!!
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Thanks! I really had a rough time trying to get it to look right.
-YD
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Awesome. Ya know, if you didn't know the S1 really existed, you would think it was almost too imaginative to be real.
I need to take short trip north to Crestline. There is a new regional called the Chicago, Ft. Wayne & Eastern that operates on PRR tracks west out of town towards Chicago that I been wanting to photograph. This is about the only PRR main in Ohio Conrail didn't pull up. (Even though they single tracked it.) The shortline is a blessing for the line. By the time CSX sold it, it was down to three trains a week.
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It's a ghost train, that's for sure, I wish the Pennsy had the farsightedness to have saved one of each of it's locomotives. Could you imagine being able to see a T1 or a S1 or an S2 or any of the other amazing locomotives they built? The Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania has a wonderful collection of PRR locomotives, but without a T1 or the S1 or any of the others, it's a disappointment.
CR tore up one of the Conemaugh Division tracks leaving it a single track and tore down the Creighton PA railroad station. I could understand streamlineing the system, but some of the things they did, made no sense.
I would like to visit Crestline sometime, how close is it to Pittsburgh? Have you seen this site? [link] and [link]
I was down to Neville Island on on Monday on the Ohio River south of Pittsburgh and saw a Pittsburgh & Ohio Central SW locomotive, but couldn't get a photo, I'm going to go back down some weekend and try to get some photos.
-YD
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You could make it to Crestline in, oh, a few hours I guess. I need to get up there and get a shot of this round house. Thanks for the link!
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nice modern edge to an art-deco illustration!!!
great work.
..
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Thanks. I appreciate you noticing the Art Deco influence in this.
-YD
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i really like the colours and composition,
but i feel that going by the curves and contour of the actual train nose, this seems a little flat...
btw....really nice work on the rails and the things that link the rails to the ground (sorry, don't know the word for them)
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cool man, looking great!!
dude, you've got great illustration style...
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Thanks! Yeah, it is a bit flat looking, I'm trying to give it a little more depth, but not having much luck. I've never found a head on photo of an S1, I'm sure one exists, but I haven't found it. I have lots of 3/4 views. I'm thinking it needs to be more egg shaped.
-YD
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