BR Standard classes

The BR Standard classes were the twelve steam designs drawn up after nationalisation under R.A. Riddles, the member of the Railway Executive responsible for mechanical and electrical engineering. They took the best features of the Big Four designs and combined them with wide fireboxes, high running plates for ease of maintenance, and a common set of fittings across the range. The first, Britannia Pacific 70000, appeared in 1951. The last steam locomotive built for British Railways, 9F 92220 Evening Star, was outshopped at Swindon in 1960.

The classes

• Class 9F, the 2-10-0 heavy freight engine, the most numerous and the last built.
• Class 7 Britannia, the mixed-traffic Pacific that transformed Great Eastern main line timings.
• Class 8 Duke of Gloucester, the single three-cylinder express Pacific, 71000.
• Class 6 Clan, a lighter Pacific for secondary routes, chiefly in Scotland.
• Class 5, the mixed-traffic 4-6-0 in the Black Five tradition.
• Classes 2, 3, and 4, the tender and tank engines for branch and secondary work.

Individual class pages carry the numbering range, quantity built, builders, and preservation record for each, cited to the RCTS Locomotives of British Railways, the Standard Classes volume. The full set of class pages is published in stages; the Class 9F page is complete.