SARS 26 Red Devil Steam Locomotion Re Invented 

As a South African immigrant railfan living in the US, I am glad you are talking about this. She's a real beut.

If you’re a fan of steam or just interested in engineering, I thoroughly recommend David Wardale’s book.From memory his calculations on cost, or notes about cost of steam v diesel was based on South Africa having no local oil production/fields, meaning the price of imported oil (or diesel) made it more expensive when compared to locally sourced coal. Michael Wood’s ‘great railway journeys of the world’ trip in South Africa shows a double header with two class 25’s. Well worth watching.

Great video. While she is standing in the harbour at the moment, hopefully the bureaucracy to get permission to maintain and run her again can be overcome by CRC. It is said, that she was an eager loco and very slippery when starting - but, once underway, was a great loco. Some of my friends who worked on her in service said she should have been converted to a 2-10-4 so that she was a bit weightier. You touched on it in the video, in the local enthusiast community there is great debate on whether to restore her with all modifications or just revert her parts to 25NC status with pros and cons for both sides of the debate. There was an earlier loco, Class 19D, which was first converted with some of these improvements, now sadly scrapped. Sandstone Estates in Ficksburg has what is known as the mini-Red Devil which is a red-painted NGG16 (2ft Gauge) and has the gas-producer firebox and other improvements. Thanks again for the video, nice to see an overseas channel showcasing our stuff!

One of the major improvements you missed is the double ported valves and cylinders. Those improvements made it more powerful and efficient. They also made it slippery and harder to handle.

The work done by DLM at Winterthur would be worth a video

Would it be too much to ask for a video on the class 25's condensing tender in the future?

It would be interesting to see how an established and successful British design could be upgraded by applying the same principles.

love the red devil even during the railroad tycoon 3 days

It's essentially a 2/3 scale American Northern in most of it's dimensions and figures. The often mentioned power output of 4,500hp is the indicated or in other terms cylinder horsepower, which doesn't take in account the friction and air resistance losses. So the drawbar horsepower of 4,023hp as on the shown stats sheet is correct. The class 26 was able to do the work of two class 34 or 35 EMD or GE diesel locomotives, but I haven't seen a cost and availability comparison either. But I know that at the time this locomotive, and its predecessor experimental and rebuilt class 19D 2644 where Wardale tested some of his ideas on were developed because of the sanctions of many countries against South Africa because of the Apartheid, with a shortage on oil as a result, while SA has an abundance of coal.

There are Niagara vs diesel charts.

Very nice looking non American steam locomotive.

The only devil you want...

Please talk about the royal hudson next!

What? No running footage? Beautiful looking engine. Can we get this built in O-Scale?? 😆

the rebuild of this steam is alive but almost a Henschel locomotive but rebuilt

I was gonna ask if you could cover the steam locomotives of South Africa but you beat me to it Thank you, i can't wait for the class 25 condenser locomotive

Ah-HA! I know what book you were reading from at the start. I have it too! THE GREAT BOOK OF TRAINS by Hollingsworth and Cook We got it about 30 years ago when I was just a toddler. I used to just look at all the pretty pictures, but over time I started to read about a few of the cooler engines. Eventually, I spread out into more and more engines, reading up on all kinds of different locomotives and how they related to each other. I've read the class 26 entry so often that I practically have it memorized, which is how I easily recognized that you were basically reciting that entry from the book. No shame there (you can tell how great it is by virtue of the fact that I'm still going back to it after 30 years and re-reading it all the time), and you clearly added more than a little bit of new content, but you might want to cite your sources at some point.

lol, steam is and was hideous!