The 2-6-2+2-6-2 was the second most numerous Garratt wheel arrangement to be built, with altogether 238 examples constructed by Beyer, Peacock & Company (BP) and its licensees.

This wheel arrangement also included the final Garratts to be built by BP, seven 2 ft (610 mm) South African Class NG G16 locomotives in 1958.

The front end of the locomotive was of a typical Garratt arrangement, with a water tank mounted on the front engine unit’s frame, while the rear end was constructed in the Modified Fairlie fashion, with the coal bunker mounted on a rigid extension of the locomotive’s main frame and with the pivoting rear engine unit positioned beneath the coal bunker.

[1] The largest user of the type was the South African Railways (SAR) who operated 132 locomotives of this wheel arrangement, spread over fifteen classes.

These two locomotives were eventually purchased by the mine, one coming to a tragic end in 1950 when it struck a lorry loaded with explosives at a level crossing, causing many deaths since the train carried miners going on shift in an open wagon.

While of the same wheel arrangement and similar power output as the 13th class locomotives, these sixteen had, amongst other improvements, bar instead of plate frames and round-topped instead of Belpaire fireboxes.

At the same time, the CFM purchased a number of locomotives from RR, including eight 14th Class Garratts, which continued to work on the Beira line from the new depot at Gondola in Mozambique.

From 1979, they were refurbished for shunting work, receiving roller bearings on the driving and coupled axles and, in many cases, larger water tanks and coal bunkers.