I have seen videos of steam locomotives pulling trains while running in reverse (tender forward). I'm curious if any/many of you actually run your steamers in reverse on your layouts? Personally I never do, but wondering how many of you run them like that? I've prepared a quick survey to poll the results. Please vote.

Poll - Do you run your steamer in reverse when pulling a train ?

Kurt

Edited by moderator 09 November 2021 11:15:05(UTC)  | Reason: Created Poll

Yes, a DB br51 with cab tender and coal train.

Sorry about the off-site poll, but I couldn't get the forum poll to work last night. I saw the checkbox to turn it on, but it didn't seem to have any effect. Thanks for setting it up here instead.

Kurt

Forum was down here all Sunday night through Monday morning E.S.T USA. I thought Juhan was doinf maintainence, but so long?

I would think that in a Kopfbahnhof setting, that a train pulling in would have new locomotives attached at the tail end to pull the train on departure. The locomotives then left at the station would reverse out and would either tail end it to a siding or would use the gleisdreieck (triangle) to change direction and prepare for their next assignment.
Some trains which were designed for push-pull use would be operated without direction change of the locomotive. I would think that in such cases, the locomotive would not be coupled to the train with the tender facing the train.
The most likely situation where you could find the locomotive running in the opposite direction would be at a direction change where there was no gleisdreieck and the only manoeuvre that was possible was to running around the train and pick up the other end. I don't know how common that was.
My focus has always been on the post-1968 era and steam has never been a major interest of mine.

Regards

Mike C

Running backwards is limited by whether there is a front coupling fitted.
Particularly disappointing is the lack of front coupling on the Henschel Wegmann tank locomotive, class 61, well the Z gauge one anyway.
I suspect that it was designed to haul in either direction.
In the Isle of Wight running bunker first was the norm for steam locos when hauling in the up direction from Ventnor to Ryde since there was no way to turn them. The Great Eastern later the LNER ran a ‘jazz’ rapid service out of Liverpool Street without turning the engines at each end. I suspect that urban railways in Berlin operated in the same way.
Again in UK the Southern Railway designed the tenders of their large locos with running in reverse in mind, an idea carried forward into BR days with the Standard designs of engine.
For large locos in Austria and Germany I’m guessing that there were plenty of turning facilities making scheduled running tender first uncommon. Hard enough sighting signals from steam engine footplates without the added difficulties when running backwards.
ChrisG