Pinewood Miniature Railway Society
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7 1/4 inch Gauge 0-4-0 Stafford Class Saddle Tank "Gentoo"
Owner, Colin Gross
Gentoo is a Stafford class 0-4-0 saddle tank designed and manufactured by
Station Road Steam which was
purchased by Colin in 2010 and you can see it in action on You Tube by clicking here.
Although a freelance design the engine is based
on the Bagnall style of industrial engines that would have been used in light
industry and quarries. Engines of this type were primarily narrow gauge engines
which were much smaller than the main line locomotives. As a result the 7 1/4"
gauge Gentoo is approximately 1/3rd of full size, but even so it weighs about
500 pounds (approx 230 Kilograms) when ready to run. The engine is 45" long with
cylinders of 2 1/4" diameter by 3" stroke and operates with a boiler pressures
of up 120 psi. When you visit Pinewood and see Gentoo you may notice that
the engine uses a marine style boiler, which is quite different to the boiler
design of most of our other engines. With normal railway boilers the ash from
the burnt coal drops through the fire grate into the ash pan, and as the pan
fills up it will spill out and drop onto the track. The marine style boiler used
on this type of engine retains the ash in a closed ash pan (which is actually
surrounded by the boiler) so the driver / fireman has occasionally to shovel the
ash out and dispose of it.
