Maiden voyage of new loco at Goldfields Railway Waihi

Goldfields Railway latest loco Hunslet DSA 551 is on the tracks and has certification to carry passengers. Photo supplied.

Goldfields Railway's new addition has taken its maiden voyage and is now a working passenger locomotive.

The third locomotive — Hunslet DSA 551 — was added to the Goldfields Railway fleet last year and the fully restored loco had its first day on the tracks on January 11.

The Goldfields Railway team is rapt with their new workhorse.

''The locomotive is performing to everyone's expectation. Drivers report that they enjoy operating it,'' says executive officer Peter Cooper.

"We had over 100 visitors from the New South Wales Junior Athletics Association ride the train (on its first day), along with a very large group of other passengers necessitating running a full compliment of carriages.

''Using DSa 551 that day demonstrated the benefit of having the heavier locomotive in our fleet, as normally we'd have put a locomotive at each end of the train to handle such a heavy passenger load.''

The loco had been worked on three years by the Goldfields Railway maintenance team. Approval from NZ Transport Authority was completed, including track upgrades to allow the heavier loco to be used.

The old locomotive had had a rich history before it ended up at Goldfields Railway and undergoing restoration.

It used to belong to New Zealand Railways Corporation which operated it, retired it and the loco went to Hastings to work as a shunter lugging fertiliser stock. Goldfields eventually bought the loco, which needed a lot of work.

It was stripped right down to the chassis and rebuilt. The engine was sandblasted, rebuilt, repainted and the air lines were restored.

The Hunslet won an award for its restoration job last year. It took the motive power award (non steam) at the annual Federation of Rail Organisations of New Zealand (FRONZ) conference in Timaru.

Peter says they now have the ability to take much larger passenger loads ''which takes some of the pressure off of their hard-working Beguley-Drewry locomotives, and frees up the smaller locos, including our Price shunter, for track maintenance duties''.

The railway was built in 1905 and Goldfields Railway society was established in 1980 to preserve the rail heritage. It runs as a popular tourist railway operating between Waihi and Waikino.