NSWGR locomotives are classified by a 1924 convention, in which the number of driving wheels is given as the first letter (C = 6-coupled, D = 8-coupled), and the class is given as the leading two digits of the road number. All road numbers were four digits, and where the class number more than 99 locomotives, the road number carries into the second digit. However, the locomotive still belongs to the base class. Thus 5469 is a "D53" class, and is engine number 169 of that class.

In practice, the letter prefix was dropped. Many classes were still commonly referred to by their pre-1924 classification, so that, for example, the 32 class were often called "P" class.

There are several indiosyncracies to this system. For example, the Garratts (AD60) class had an additional "A" to indicate that they were Articulated.

This part of the photo collection is the most extensive, mainly because I lived in Sydney during the years 1970 to 1973, and travelled on many of the last steam runs while steam was still in revenue service on the NSWGR.

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