There are more than a few steam locomotives sitting in parks across Japan, enjoying their retirement.

I wanted to acknowledge the ones I happen across for all their hard work, so I started the Static Life Steam Locomotives Project, SLSL for short.

^{_{A map of the Static Life Steam Locomotives & more about the project is here.}}

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The Class 9600 were the first mass produced locomotives in Japan, starting manufacture by JGR (Japanese Government Railways) in 1913. They are, in fact, the longest serving locomotives in Japan – the last of them didn’t retire until 1976.

They were used mostly for freight services, seeing a fair bit of action overseas as well during Japan’s expansionist period. After World War II, a lot of them just ended up staying where they were. A number were renamed Class KD5 and saw service in China, where they were also converted into Class KD55.

You can see KD55-579 & KD5-373 on display in the China Railway Museum in Beijing, as a result.

DT609, a locomotive built from a design derived from the 9600, can be found at Takao Railway Museum in Taiwan. (I think they’re both on my map already.)

This particular 9600, however, can be found at the back of Kumamoto City Musuem, which is itself just at the back of Kumamoto Castle.

Built in Taisho 12 (1923), it moved to Kumamoto in Showa 15 (1940) where it hauled freight for 30 years on the Hohi line (you may remember it from the trip to Musashizuka Station.) The sign doesn’t really say what it was doing before it ended up in Kumamoto, so it maybe it was a black ops kind of a train with a dark mysterious past.

Whatever it was doing, it travelled 2,538,921 kilometres in its lifetime which is equivalent to 63 global circuits. (Although having been on the Hohi line, I don’t think the scenery was quite up to actually going around the world.)

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You can visit 9600-69665 here.

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And here’s some technical data for those of you who enjoy that kind of thing –

Here’s a breakdown of the details about this train, taken from the appendix to Steam Locomotives of Japan, Naotaka Hirota: Kodansha International (1972).

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TYPE 9600 (2-8-0 tender locomotive)

CYLINDER: 508 x 610mm
BOILER PRESSURE: 13.0kg/cm²
FIRE GRATE AREA: 2.32m²
TOTAL HEATING SURFACE: 154.5m²
– SUPER HEATING SURFACE: 35.2m²
– EVAPORATIVE HEATING SURFACE: 119.3m²
– HEATING SURFACE OF SMOKE TUBES: 108.4m²
– HEATING SURFACE OF FIRE BOX: 10m²
– HEATING SURFACE OF ARCH TUBES: 0.9m²
BOILER CAPACITY: 5.2m³
LARGE SMOKE TUBES (diameter x length x number) 133 x 4039 mm x 22
SMALL SMOKE TUBES (diameter x length x number) 51 x 4039 mm x 126
WEIGHT OF ENGINE (in working order) 60.53t
WEIGHT OF ENGINE (empty) 54.83t
ADHESIVE WEIGHT OF ENGINE (in working order) 52.73t
WEIGHT OF TENDER (in working order) 34.50t
WEIGHT OF TENDER (empty) 15.50t
WATER CAPACITY : 13m³
FUEL CAPACITY : 6.00t
VALVE GEAR : Walschaert’s
INTRODUCED : 1913