Australia's West Coast Wilderness Railway

[Memma1]

Hi All

Another trip report if anyone's interested - this one is a little random but a super interesting trip on Tasmania's West Coast Wilderness Railway between the tiny remote towns of Strahan and Queenstown. What makes this trip interesting is the historic 1896 built steam locomotives that pull the train up at one point a 1:15 (6.67%) grade - the steepest ascent in the Southern Hemisphere - on an ABT rack and pinion system.

https://trainreview.com/article/exploring-tasmania-on-the-west-coast-wilderness-railway

I thought it may be of interest.

I hope everyone is safe and well!

 

[ShePointsIDig]

Great armchair journey to an interesting place!

The British Rail Class 04 shunting locomotive that shows up if you poke around the WCWR "Meet our heritage diesel locomotives" webpage, here https://www.wcwr.com.au/news/meet-our-heritage-diesel-locomotives caught my eye.

The diesel locomotive with the rod-driven drive wheels is interesting. I had never seen anything like that. Wikipedia describes the drive train thus:

The engine is a Gardner 8-cyl, 4-stroke 8L3 developing 204 hp (152 kW) at 1200 rpm, connected to a Wilson-Drewry CA5 R7, 5-speed epicyclic [think Sturmey-Archer "English Bike" internally-geared hub] with RF11 spiral bevel reverse and final drive unit mounted on a jackshaft. The drive to the wheels was by coupling rods from the jackshaft. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Class_04

Thanks for posting. Made for a pleasant afternoon.
Art