The R 4/4 was a tank locomotive for heavy shunting service, which was built in small numbers for the Pfalzbahn from 1913 and was later procured in larger numbers by the Bavarian State Railways. Although they worked with saturated steam, they proved their efficiency and were able to survive into the Bundesbahn era. The boiler with a relatively large diameter was placed very high in order to be able to accommodate a generously dimensioned and wide but not too long firebox above the coupled wheels. The water tank was therefore installed below the boiler, since there was now more space than on the sides.

Production for the Pfalzbahn included nine engines that were completed in 1913 and 1914. There they were mainly used for shunting over longer distances, as they could reach a maximum speed of 45 km/h on the flat with trains of up to 1,000 tonnes.

Between 1918 and 1925, Bavaria procured another 42 engines, which in terms of performance hardly differed from the Palatinate type. However, they had additional water tanks on the sides of the boiler, which increased the water supply to up to nine cubic meters. In addition, the steam dome and the sandbox were now arranged separately from each other and were no longer located under a common cover on the top of the boiler. In 1925, the Reichsbahn took over all but two machines and gave them the numbers 92 2001 to 92 2049. The remaining two had been handed over to Saarland in 1921 and only returned in 1935. After the Second World War, almost all of the examples remained with the Bundesbahn, which used them in the Palatinate and Bavaria. The last one was retired in 1962.