Robert Kay

The twenty-five 'W' class diesel hydraulic 0-6-0 shunting locomotives were built by Tulloch between 1959 and 1961 for the Victorian Railways. The class was originally built with Mercedes-Benz engines and Krupp transmissions. The Mercedes Benz engines were quite troublesome and ten of the class were upgraded to General Motors engines between 1973 and 1977.

I have read that the 'W' class were not popular with train crews - they were very noisy and the diesel fumes from the exhaust would hang around the cab windows and doors, making it an unpleasant place to be working.

Withdrawal of the locos commenced in the late 1970's and the remainder were out of service by 1985. Several have been preserved.

In the photo above, the local yard pilot W-263 is seen stabled with Australian National Railways Goodwin-Alco 942 around the eighty five foot electric turntable at Ararat loco depot. The A.N.R '930' class loco had been brought to Victoria from South Australia to train the Ararat loco crews on the operation of the loco so it could be used for through running on goods trains between Melbourne and Adelaide. 12:40pm, Saturday the 29th of October, 1983.