Gavin,
The locomotive does have a stoker, however its never been used since the locomotive was restored at the museum around 1972. The stoker motor was completely rebuilt a few years ago, however the gear box behind the coal bin to the auger is in need of rebuilding. The stoker had been tried a few times, but we hand fire the locomotive. We have a 5 mile railroad we run on, and the locomotive never gets worked very hard for long periods of time to necesitate it. If it ever got onto a main line railroad with a high tonnage train, the stoker would be just about a requirement. We actualy just a few months ago pulled the longest train a steam locomotive ever had at the museum to any of our knowledge. We took a 32 car string of passenger and freight cars and walked them down part of the railroad to see how the old girl would pull it. Hardly hesitated. Now if we did that train at 45 miles per hour or so for any length of time that stoker would have for sure come in handy! Im really proud to have learned firing on that locomotive however, because learning how to hand fire a locomotive that large to start with should make it much easier to fire any thing else, and it makes you really fine tune the art. If your interested in seeing pics of the locomoive, look at
www.irm.org and look for 1630 in the photo gallery. Thanks again for your responses!
Brian