Lima Locomotive Works

Lima Locomotive Works was an American firm that manufactured railroad locomotives from the 1870s through the 1950s. The company took the most distinctive part of its name from its main shops location in Lima, Ohio. The shops were located between the Baltimore & Ohio's Cincinnati-Toledo main line and the Nickel Plate Road main line and shops.

The company is best known for producing the Shay geared logging-steam locomotive, developed by Ephraim Shay, and for William E. Woodard's "Super Power" advanced steam locomotive concept – exemplified by the prototype 2-8-4 Berkshire, Lima demonstrator A-1.

In 1878 James Alley contracted the Lima Machine Works to build a steam locomotive that Ephraim Shay had designed. In April 1880, Lima rebuilt Ephraim Shay's original design, using vertically side-mounted pistons mounted on the right, connected to a drive line on the outside of the trucks. The Shay was geared down to provide more slow-moving, pulling ability for use in the lumber industry. The first Shay locomotive was built in 1880; it was such a success that many people in the lumber industry wanted one. To accommodate the new demand for the locomotive, Shay licensed the right to build his locomotive to the Lima Machine Works, which expanded and began to ship Shay locomotives to lumbermen across the frontier. Two years later, locomotives were the main product being produced by the Lima Machine Works, which would produce over 300 locomotives during the next ten years.

After a serious fire, a new shop was opened in 1902 and Shay production continued. Then, with initial demand for low-speed geared locomotives well on the way to being sated, and the new facilities in place, Lima moved into the heavy railroad locomotive field.

Success returned to Lima in the 1920s with the new concept of "Super Power" developed by Lima's mechanical engineer William E. Woodard. By making a number of significant changes to maximize a steam locomotive's capacity to generate and utilize steam, Woodard was able to make such locomotives significantly more powerful and faster. He did this by starting in 1922 with the H-10 experimental heavy 2-8-2 design for the New York Central (Michigan Central 8000) and applying both relatively new science (the Cole ratios), and every efficiency-enhancing tool available – a larger firebox, increased superheat, a feedwater heater, improved draughting, higher boiler pressure, streamlined steam passages and a trailing-truck booster engine, and by applying limited cutoff (the range of steam valve admission settings) to prevent locomotive engineers from using excessive steam at starting. The 2-8-2 thus produced was demonstrated to be 26% more efficient overall than its immediate predecessor, and the NYC bought 301 copies.

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