Bachmann have just announced a newly tooled model of the popular LMS Stanier Class 8F 2-8-0 steam locomotive in OO Gauge, for the first time in their range!

The LMS Stanier Class 8F 2-8-0 was one of Britain’s most numerous and successful steam locomotives, and after producing award winning models of the iconic type for its Graham Farish N Scale range, ninety years since the first example emerged from the LMS’s Crewe Works it’s time to welcome OO scale models of the 8F to Bachmann’s Branchline range for the first time.

A new subject for the Bachmann Branchline range, the 8F joins a burgeoning stable of LMS machines and draws inspiration from its award winning smaller brother produced by the company’s Graham Farish brand.

Tooling for the Branchline 8F is now complete and the livery samples will arrive for review in the coming weeks. All are available to pre-order now for release in 2026 - available DCC Ready, DCC Sound Fitted or Deluxe Sound Fitted.

Designed by William Stanier for the London, Midland & Scottish Railway (LMS), the 8F was the modern solution that the LMS had been looking for to reduce dependency on its overstretched fleet of 0-6-0s, and its ageing 0-8-0s. The 2-8-0s built by Stanier’s former employer the Great Western Railway (GWR) had already revolutionised locomotive design and performance, and Stanier incorporated several design cues from those successful machines into the 8F.

The construction, operators and working lives of the 8Fs is complicated, but essentially 852 were built, albeit just 331 had been ordered by the LMS, the first of which was built at Crewe in 1935 and the last at Horwich in 1945.

As the Second World War took hold, Robert Riddles, the Mechanical & Electrical Engineer for the LMS Scottish Region, who had been seconded to the Ministry of Supply, intervened when an order for 300 ROD 2-8-0s was placed. The ‘ROD’s had proven themselves invaluable during the First World War, but Riddles instead insisted that Stanier 8Fs would be the War Department’s standard steam locomotive for this new conflict.

As a result, further orders were placed with a multitude of workshops across England and Scotland and 8Fs were built by all of the ‘Big 4’ – the GWR, LNER and Southern Railway (SR), as well as the LMS and outside contractors. The Ministry of Supply ordered 208 for the War Department, most of which were sent overseas, mainly to serve with the Middle East Forces of the British Army. Of the 8Fs that operated outside of Britain, some were lost in transit and never saw service, others were lost in action, and following the cessation of hostilities, many of the overseas machines were sold, mainly to state railways in the Middle East but some as far afield as China, whilst several returned to the UK.

The Railway Executive Committee (REC), which took control of the Big 4 during World War Two, ordered 245 more for the LMS. These were built by the GWR, LNER and SR, with the GWR and LNER effectively being loaned the locomotives they had built until after the war.

The LNER placed its own orders for Stanier’s design too, which is classified as O6, these came from Brighton Works (25) and its own Darlington (23) and Doncaster Works (20), totalling 68 locomotives. In all, 852 Stanier 8Fs had been built once the last examples were completed in 1945.

By the time of Nationalisation in 1948, British Railways (BR) inherited a total of 624 8Fs; the LMS fleet of 331 was now notionally 311-strong following requisitions and re-acquisitions, but remember that they also effectively held ownership of the 245 REC locomotives and the 68 from the LNER. Following various repatriations, the BR- fleet peaked at 666 between 1957 and 1960, with the overwhelming majority falling under the control of the London Midland Region, although a small number enjoyed allocations on the Western Region.

For a fleet so large, variations were few and far between, the most obvious being the use of Stanier 4,000-gallon tenders with either rivetted or welded bodies, with some later receiving Fowler 3,500-gallon versions after losing their Stanier tenders to Jubilees.

In service the 8F’s duties were easily defined, it if was long and heavy, an 8F would haul it. Their economic performance and versatility saw them hauling coal, cement, cattle, perishables, ballast, oil; all was within the capabilities of Stanier’s ultimate freight locomotive. Passenger turns were not unheard of either, particularly during summer weekends and excursion traffic. The Class endured until 1960 when the first example succumbed to withdrawal, yet only a single locomotive bowed out, joined by four more in 1962. It was 1964 that saw the first double digit withdrawals yet at the start of 1968, the final year of steam working on British Rail, 150 were still in use centred around North West England, the final bastion of steam. It would be an 8F, No. 48518, that would haul the last commercially operated steam-hauled goods train on BR, while classmate No. 48773, which is now preserved, operated on the 4th August 1968, the final day of ‘normal’ steam on BR, hauling a leg of the Locomotive Club of Great Britain’s ‘Farewell to Steam Railtour’.

For such a large Class it is perhaps disappointing that just eight Stanier 8Fs remain in the UK today. Two of these have been repatriated from Turkey, while four more remain there along with a single example in Israel and one in Iraq, bringing the total to 14 still in existence on dry land – others remain underwater following their loss at sea during World War Two.