What do you do when both of your steam locomotives are on their last legs and you don't have enough dollars in the bank to purchase even a cheap diesel? You build your own, of course. This beauty was completed in 1955 by SSLV mechanics and had banished steam from the SSLV by 1957. It combined standard gauge steam locomotive tender trucks, an I-H diesel engine, a Caterpillar hydraulic transmission, a Euclid truck axle,
chains and sprockets and a lot of imagination. Note the liberal application of "turn signals" and the four hooks across the end of the unit, presumably for a poling pole or maybe to hang out the wash on Wednesdays..... I noticed that it was still at Blanca the summer of 2008 when I visited the nearby Rio Grande Scenic.
The worst of railroad design. Please, send me your entries / suggestions for the "Album of the ugly trains of the world" (past or present, paint scheme or shape).
