World’s final English Electric locomotive now safe in museum hands
THE last locomotive built by English Electric has been preserved on the far side of the world.
English Electric produced nearly 1000 diesel and electric locomotives of nine different classes for BR as part of the 1950s Modernisation Plan. In 1968, the company’s operations were merged with GEC.
With the construction of a new 3ft 6in gauge line from Launceston to Bell Bay, Tasmanian Government Railways placed an order for four CoCo diesels with English Electric.
The last two were delivered in 1976, ZA6 being the final locomotive built not only by GEC Australia; until 2014 the last new locomotive built for Tasmania, and the last constructed by English Electric anywhere in the world.
Milestone
The 150th anniversary of the opening of Tasmania’s first railway, which ran between Launceston and Deloraine and was operated by the Launceston and Western Railway Company, was marked by ZA6 – later TasRail No. 2118 – being delivered to the Tasmanian Transport Museum in Glenorchy on January 14. It was brought 125 miles by lorry from TasRail’s East Tamar site in Launceston.
The locomotive has been out of service since July 2005, when it was sidelined with traction motor faults.
Much of the impetus for saving ZA6 came from the founding management committee of Diesel Traction Tasmania, the creation of which in 2011 was prompted by the increasing withdrawals of the large English Electric locomotives and fears that they would be scrapped because they were too large for heritage groups to accommodate them.
The museum’s initial aim is to cosmetically restore ZA6, which will include a full repaint into the Australian National green and gold livery which had been applied in 1988, with special logos applied as part of the Australian Bicentennial celebrations.
Several missing electrical and mechanical parts will be replaced to allow ZA6 to run again.
Ownership
The museum also owns X1, the very first government main line English Electric locomotive to operate in Australia.
The president of the museum, Rod Prince, said: “We are extremely grateful to TasRail for entrusting us with the preservation of such an important and historic locomotive.
“Some 275 locomotives were built at the English Electric (later GEC) factory in Rocklea, Queensland.
“Not only was ZA6 the last English Electric locomotive built there, but it was also the last English Electric diesel locomotive built in the world.
“It marks the first V12 English Electric locomotive in Tasmania to be preserved in a museum.”
A GoFundMe page to raise money for the restoration has been launched, which can be found at https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-us-restore-za6
Meanwhile, preservationists fear for the future of TasRail’s remaining stored English Electric locomotives, which could face scrapping.