Over the course of the steam era, the Union Pacific (and it's subsidiaries) came to own over 350 2-8-2 mikado type steam locomotives. While at first being assigned to mainline freights, they were eventually regulated to shortlines, local/mid-size freights, and yard duties. We have still yet to see a nice mid-size american steamer in TS yet, and with the Wasatch Grade route being out for a while now, I believe the MK's would be a perfect addition to the route and train simulator as a whole. Between 1911 and 1921, the UP had ordered over 30 batches of mikados, with their classifications ranging from MK-1 to MK-10. These locomotives were built by all three major locomotive manufacturers, Baldwin, Lima, and ALCO. A large portion of these locomotives were given to subsidiary railroads such as the Oregon Shortline Railroad, Pacific & Idaho Northern Railroad and the Oregon-Washington Railroad and Navigation Company. Between 1918, and 1919, 20 mikados were given to the UP by the USRA as part of the war effort. These locomotives were classified as MK-Spl's. During World War II, Union Pacific attempted to change how they named 2-8-2's by calling them MacArthurs instead of Mikados. Unfortunately for the UP, the name never really stuck and a number of crew members simply referred to them as "Mikes". As the years went on, the locomotives underwent a number of cosmetic changes. Their centered number boards and high mounted headlights were replaced with centered headlights with flying number boards, and several had their Vanderbilt tenders swapped for standard shaped ones. Many locomotives stopped carrying the UP shield logo on their cabs and tenders, instead having their road numbers or "Union Pacific" written in plain lettering in their place. While stats can vary among the early classes of Mikes, locomotives from the MK-3 class onward were more or less the same, with only minor alterations being made to the locomotive's design. They were built with 63 inch drivers, Walschaert valve gear, a boiler pressure of 200 PSI, a top speed of about 75 MPH, and a tractive effort of around 45,000 lbs. Not the most powerful locomotives by modern steam locomotive standards, but for their time they could get the job done well. As the steam era began drawing to a close, the UP's smaller locomotives were among the first to go. This included their Mikados. Many were either retired or relegated to shortline service by the early 50's, however several of them managed to hold out in yard and helper service around Cheyenne and Sherman Hill up until the end of the steam era. By 1959, all were retired. As of today there are a small handful of UP Mikes scattered across the US on display. Those locomotives being #'s 2295, 2564, 2537 and 2005. As I stated at the beginning of this post, we have yet to see a Mid-Size American steam locomotive in Train Simulator. Adding the UP MK's would be a great way to change that. They already have a period correct route for them to run on (Wasatch Grade), they were used on several different railroads during a wide ranging time period, so there could be lots of extra liveries bundled with the locomotives and they would be great for use on community made shortline routes as well. What do you guys think? Agree? Disagree? Somewhere in the middle?
I gotta agree with you here. It'd definitely be nice to see more American steamers in Train Sim, and the UP Mikados would definitely be a good starting place.
For a while now I've been advocating for more mid-size American steam in particular. We already have lots of the big 4-8-4's, and articulated engines in the game as well as the smaller locomotives such as the 1800's era 4-4-0's and a couple of 2-8-0's. But we only have one mid-size engine and that's the Pennsy K-4. I think it would be nice to have some more mid-size locos (4-6-2's, 2-8-2's, 4-6-0's etc.) to balance things out but it seems nobody else shares my sentiment since a lot of my more recent proposals never really gained any traction (the same can be said for my route proposals).
Could possibly start getting higher quality American steam loco DLC's that're more akin to what the Bossman Games Rebuilt Merchant Navy class, as an example, has achieved here recently. If not that high of quality, definitely something of FEF-3 quality. Maybe not have the sounds be as loud as the FEF-3, but something of that overall quality.
Yes, a few did! As I mentioned in my original post #'s 2295, 2564, 2537, and 2005 are still around today and are on display in museums, parks and stations across the Western US. I even saw 2564 in person a couple of years ago when I visited the Orange Empire Railway Museum.
These locomotives would be a good dlc for my route I suggested called Spirit of Steam: Omaha-Lincoln in the 1920s.
