Great Northern Railroad EM1

No, they did not.  The B&O was the only railroad to roster EM-1 2-8-8-4 Yellowstone locomotives.  The Southern Pacific, the Duluth, Missabe & Iron Range, and the Northern Pacific also rostered 2-8-8-4 Yellowstones, but they were of different designs and did not look like the B&O EM-1.   Lionel issued the additional road names as a sort of "what-if" those railroads owned this particular model locomotive.

See the following link: http://www.steamlocomotive.com/yellowstone/

No EM-1's on the Great Northern. There were R class 2-8-8-2s on the GN

The Northern pacific had a z-5 class which were of the 2-8-8-4 wheel arrangement, same as the EM-1. This class was called "Yellowstones"

Thank's Bill, that's what I thought. Sort of spoils the idea for me. I really like those monsters tho :-)

No problem ray zack.  I wish Lionel would include this sort of information in their descriptions, but they usually do not.  They should have also called them Yellowstones and not "Giants" as the catalog header described them.

Hey, if the Pennsy once borrowed an N&W A-Class for trials (before they decided on the J1 order), you can run that on a mostly Pennsy layout. So just take that one step further, and invent the scenario for the GN and an EM-1.

PRR also used N&W J 610 in testing.

Now, why didn't PRR go with the A?  Guess the best thing the PRR did did to the N&W was to take the dividend check, and leave it alone.

Just my opinion, but the Great Northern wouldn't be caught dead with a B&O EM-1! 

The B&O EM-1s didn't have a belpair firebox, and the only big locomotives on the GN that didn't where the S2 "Montana" class 4-8-4s.

Dominic,

According to a Pennsylvania Book I had, when the Pennsy rented the A they "noted" that while running the A had excessive back pressure and had poor water consumption. Also the Pennsy didn't like how it did not have a water scoop and so it "held up traffic" while getting water. 

The back pressure and poor water consumption was probably due to the poor coal and water system the PRR had compared to the N&W. N&W had coal quality and water quality down to a science. 

Not really! The PRR crews probably didn't know how to operate the N&W "A", any better than they knew how to operate their own T1s and Q2s. Check out the latest Classic Trains special edition "Steam Glory 3" issue, pages 8 thru 17, on the PRR T1, by David R, Stevenson. That article will really open your eyes about PRR locomotive maintenance AND crew training.

Concerning the PRR test of an N&W Class A,,,,,,the PRR wouldn't know a great steam locomotive if it bit them in the ***!

Actually, the GN also had class P-2 Mountains, and O-3 Mikados which had radial stayed fireboxes.

Also, GN had been looking into several designs for 2-8-8-4's, one of which would have rebuilt from R-1 2-8-8-2's with 63" drivers, but the firebox grate enlarged to 180 sq. ft., while Baldwin proposed a design which would have had 69" drivers, 180 sq. ft. of grate, 240 psi boiler, and 133,000 lbs of tractive effort.

In addition both Baldwin and GN had designs for 2-6-6-4's, with the Baldwins having 69" drivers, while the GN's had 73" drivers.  Also using 73" drivers was a GN design for a 4-6-6-4.  And Alco proposed a 4-4-4-6 with 84" drivers!

Of course all had Belpaire fireboxes

Stuart

As is being discussed in another thread, the railroad that introduced a wheel arrangement generally had the right to name it. NP put the first 2-8-8-4 into service and chose the name "Yellowstone" from the territory the railroad served, including Yellowstone Nat'l Park. The 4-8-4 was also introduced by them and called the "Northern Pacific" type, later shortened to just "Northern".

The EM-1's filled a gap in motive power caused by unprecedented traffic during World War II and a halt in diesel locomotive production for the duration. Diesels required too much vital materiel, especially copper for electric components. EM-1's were the lightest Yellowstones ever built. They had all the extras - cast frames, roller bearings, feedwater heaters - but they may not have worked well on railroads that required brute force.

I vaguely recall that an EM-1 pressed into passenger service derailed. Apparently, the top speed was 40 mph, more than enough for B&O trains but not enough for fast service on the UP, for example.

Steam locomotives were as different as fingerprints. When the PRR copied C&O 2-10-4's, those giants sported a PRR "look."

Manufacturers apply different road names to the same steamer to increase sales. But fans of each road notice "foreigners" right away.

Ray

If you are looking for an O scale model of an articulated actually operated by the GN look for a Z-6 or an R-2.  MTH and Sunset have offered models of the former and MTH and Weaver have made the latter.