The tests of the Gt 12/12x2 showed a remarkable tendency of the machine to straighten the tracks. Of course, even using all possible expedients, the wheelbase of 6 driving axles was not easily compatible with the curvature radii of the Bavarian hill.
In a burst of creativity and with an eye overseas, where Erie had managed to overcome the limit of the two articulated power units with its Triplex, in Bavaria they wanted to pursue a different path: thus was born this Gt 4/4x3, which used the same units as the Gt 4/4x2 and its sister Gt 6/6x2, maintaining the traction characteristics without being excessively heavy on the armament.
Put into service at the beginning of 1914, the locomotive served in pair with the 89 771 on the Schiefe Ebene, where they pushed heavy convoys at 35/40 Km/h without great difficulty.
At the end of the First World War the locomotive was hidden so as not to be requisitioned as war booty by the victors. The secret was kept so well that no one knew anything about it until 1932 when by pure chance, in a warehouse in Altneuendorf im Innenausen near Bad Kitzingen, it was found by a DRG manager who had gone off on a trip with his girlfriend.
It's nice to think that a mechanical monster can turn into an alcove and for once it did.
The two of them, whose names I am not allowed by privacy law to release (she is still alive and is the only source of information on the matter) turned the Gt 4/4x3 into their personal cabin and did not speak until his death from natural causes in 1986. Only significant arterial sclerosis brought the secret down in 2001. A visit to the depot unfortunately removed all illusions. In the following years, the locomotive had been transformed into a comfortable 3-story apartment building by some enterprising non-Europeans. Let's enjoy these drawings, which have become the last vestiges of one of the masterpieces of the world's railway technology, and let's imagine to see it passing at the end of an endless row of wagons in its Bavarian green livery.