Mt Newman Mining Locomotive #5464 was an Alco C636 diesel used in the Pilbara mining region during the 1970's.
The early C636 locomotives were supplied by Alco in the United States, but the company went out of business in 1970. Subsequent units were built by Commonwealth Engineering (Comeng) in Sydney and classed as M636 models. The locomotive was powered by a 16 cylinder Alco 251F diesel engine rated at 2685 kW (3600 hp). Mt Newman Mining operated 54 of the type in all.
There are no HO scale model train locomotives produced in the Mt Newman Mining livery, so I bought a used C636 locomotive from Canada, stripped all the paint and attachments, installed an ESU Loksound decoder with authentic sound and voila. When it arrived from Canada, it was damaged beyond belief, so I was given a full refund and told to keep the remains...LOL.
After many hours repairing the damage and restoring it to original condition, I'm more than happy with the result and delighted that it now sits proudly as part of my collection of WA and specifically, Pilbara locomotives.
