and the only one still operational is the 4449, and what a beauty it is to see chuffing and puffing!
There is a great book out called "Southern Pacific Daylight Steam Locomotives", by Kenneth G. Johnsen and published by Traintech. There is a picture of 4446 with a wrecked nose on page 99.
The 4446 rearended the Lark when it was only a few months old, at Wellsona, Ca. on Sept. 19, 1941. The Lark had made an unscheduled stop. And although it looked totalled, it was rebuilt and put back into service.

I will start out saying I am brand new.
I bought a very cheap used train a couple weeks ago (my first one,I feel like I am 8, but I am almost 4 decades older than that). I set it up under the christmas tree with EZ Track. It absolutely flys, even with the small 5.5VA transformer it came with.
I got a Bachmann 4-8-4, SP 4449 for Christmas. Lubed axles as per the hobbie shop we bought it at, railed it (what a chore compared to the little junker), and started running it slowly to "break it in", again according to the hobbie shop. After a couple hours, I sped it up, but even at full throttle, it seemed very slow (about 1/4 speed of little junker).
Went today and bought a bigger transformer, 18VA, and it gets a little more speed, but not much. It takes about 40% throttle to get it started moving, just a crawl, and at 75% it is still moving fairly slow.
Is this normal for these "bigger" locomotives?