26 June 2011

A Study of VR Rail Tractors (RT)

Below are various photos of VR Rail Tractors (RT) taken on 16 and 17 June 2011.

Seen in 2 days were no less than 15 RTs.  The majority stored at Bendigo.

SSR - LT4 (Formerly RT54) Shunter at SSR Workshops Gladstone St
SSR - LT50 (Formerly RT50) Shunter at SSR Workshops Gladstone St
SSR - RT37 Stored at SSR Workshops Murphy St
PN - RT 14, 38, 5, 35, 42, 47, 45, 6, 49, 27 - Stored at SSR Workshop Murphy St
PN - RT31 - Stables at Glencore/Graincorp Siding Deniliquin
Glencore/Graincorp - RT46 - Stabled at Deniliquin with RT31.

 RT 14

 RT31 - Deniliquin
RT35 - complete with Vline logos. 

SSR owned RT37  

The original wagon builders plate on RT37 - dating to 1904.  The other side had the RT builders plate of the late 1950s.

 RT42

 RT47 - One of three orange RTs sighted (others being RT35 anf RT37)

 LT50 inside SSR workshops.

Unique Aresco build RT46 at Deniliquin.  I believe this unit was at Morwell and painted yellow for a long time.  It must have gone to Deniliquin and got painted in the early 1990s.  Anyone with more info on the unit would be great. 


LT4 (former RT54) which was owned by the Port Authority at Portland.  I believe this unit was also built by Aresco,  It spent years at Echuca as the shunt unit before ending up with SSR at Bendigo. 

The control inside the cab of LT4.  The engraved panel at the back contains details such as siding lengths in Portland Yard, and the capabilites of the unit in VHGF and GY wagons.

Enjoy!

4 comments:

  1. rt 46 was yellow and was used to make up the briquete trains at Morwell, it had a high and low gear box and a single lever which was the throttle when pushed forwards and when pulled back it was like a gear box retarder and it slowed down.It was some times used to take loads out to Hazelwood power station which was being built at the time, My name is David Edwards and I used to drive this tractor every now and then in mid to late 60;s

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  2. Thanks for the information David. INteresting stuff!

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  3. I have a bit more of a thought about RT 46 and I think it was called an Aresco Track Chief, it did have a foot brake but never worked that well and was not known to break any speed records hope this helps you a bit more.
    Dave

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  4. As an aside to this, I believe there was a number swap taken between RT's 14 and 37, as shown by the photo I've attached below. I'd guess that the original RT37 was dead while RT14 was closer to an operational unit so they simply swapped numbers

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/greensleeves94/8734816790/

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