In the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotive wheel arrangement, an 0-10-0 is a locomotive with ten driving wheels (five axles) and neither leading nor trailing wheels. Because of that lack, it is not stable at speed and is a type confined to fairly low-speed work, such as switching, transfer runs, slow-speed drag freight, or running over mountainous terrain.
United States
The 0-10-0 was not very popular in the US and North America in general; probably less than fifty of this type were constructed. For switching work, large 0-8-0s were preferred, and if more than four driven axles were needed, the preference was for articulated locomotives, such as 0-6-6-0s and 0-8-8-0s. Out on the main line, a 2-10-0, with the added stability of its leading truck, or a 2-10-2 or 2-10-4 with room for larger fireboxes, were preferred.
The first 0-10-0 in the United States was delivered in 1891 to the St. Clair Tunnel Company to haul trains between Sarnia, Ontario and Port Huron, Michigan. Next were a series of 21 locomotives for the New York Central Railroad and its subsidiaries for hump yard work. Others included seven owned by the Illinois Central, three by the Canadian Pacific Railway, fifteen by the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, two by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and four, the heaviest built, for the Duluth, Missabe and Iron Range.
United Kingdom
Two 0-10-0s saw service on British railways; a suburban tank locomotive prototype built by the Great Eastern Railway in 1902, and a tender locomotive built by the Midland Railway in 1919 specifically as a banker for the Lickey Incline.
Germany
The 0-10-0 type proved quite popular in Germany. Several types of freight tender locomotives of this arrangement were built between approximately 1905–1915 after which it was abandoned in favor of the 2-10-0. Subsequent German locomotives of this type were tank locomotives, including classes BR82 , BR87 , BR940 , BR941 , BR942-4 , BR945-17 , BR9419-21 and BR975 .