4-4-0

4-4-0 is a locomotive type with a classification that uses the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives by wheel arrangement and represents the arrangement: four leading wheels on two axles (usually in a leading bogie), four powered and coupled driving wheels on two axles, and a lack of trailing wheels. Due to the large number of the type that were produced and used in the United States, the 4-4-0 is most commonly known as the American type, but the type subsequently also became popular in the United Kingdom, where large numbers were produced. Almost every major railroad that operated in North America in the first half of the 19th century owned and operated locomotives of this type. The first use of the name American to describe locomotives of this wheel arrangement was made by Railroad Gazette in April 1872. Prior to that, this wheel arrangement was known as a standard or eight-wheeler. This locomotive type was so successful on railroads in the United States that many earlier and locomotives were rebuilt as 4-4-0s by the middle of the 19th century. Several 4-4-0 tank locomotives were built, but the vast majority of locomotives of this wheel arrangement were tender engines. Five years after new locomotive construction had begun at the West Point Foundry in the United States with the Best Friend of Charleston in 1831, the first 4-4-0 locomotive was designed by Henry R. Campbell, at the time the chief engineer for the Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown Railway. Campbell received a patent for the design in February 1836 and soon set to work building the first 4-4-0. At the time, Campbell's 4-4-0 was a giant among locomotives. Its cylinders had a bore with a piston stroke, it boasted driving wheels, could maintain of steam pressure and weighed . Campbell's locomotive was estimated to be able to pull a train of at on level track, outperforming the strongest of Baldwin's s in tractive effort by about 63%. However, the frame and driving gear of his locomotive proved to be too rigid for the railroads of the time, which caused Campbell's prototype to be derailment-prone.