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Martinus Rail DA 1507

(The real DA 1507 was rebuilt as DC 4041).

DA 1507 - better known by her current designation; DC 4041 - was built by General Motors in 1966, and entered service in July of that year. As with 1480/DC 4692, DA 1507 wasn’t even 20 years old when she was sent to Australia for rebuilding. This engine was one of the early DC rebuilds, being sent to Clyde Engineering in July 1977. DA 1507 was rebuilt as DC 4041, with this work being finished in May 1978. The engine returned to New Zealand soon after.

4041 was first out-shopped in International Orange colours. Curiously she received nose-mounted headlights in 1987 (as was the case with classmate DC 4127), but only had these lights briefly as they were never adopted as a standard feature. Three years later - in 1990 - this engine was apparently involved in a derailment at Lepperton in Taranaki. Of course, she was rebuilt and put back into service.

In November 2000, DC 4041 was repainted again. This time she received Tranz Rail blue, and was actually a bit of a late entry into that ‘crowd’ (for want of a better word). By 2009 she had received a new design of tail lights, but only on the front end (she still had the old tail light design at the back). 4041 is notable because the rear of her long-hood was taken from a scrapped ‘Phase 3’ DA after an accident, presumably the one at Lepperton in 1990. At least one other DC - 4058 - has different tail lights at each end, just like 4041.

Back in her Tranz Rail livery days, I remember seeing DC 4041 a few times in Mount Maunganui, so that’s one of many reasons why I have a personal connection to this locomotive. It wasn’t until January 2012 when she was finally repainted in the KiwiRail livery.

Five years later - in July 2017 - I came across DC 4041 again in Waharoa. On that day I was heading up to the Coromandel to go and ride the Driving Creek Railway. More recently - in July 2019 - 4041 turned up at Mount Maunganui (for some reason), which was immediately after I finished a trip down to Ohakune, Taihape and Palmerston North.

In late 2019, DC 4041 was withdrawn from service and placed in storage at Hutt Workshops. Thankfully, for 4041 at least, this wasn’t the end of her service life, seeing as she was sold to Martinus Rail mid-way through 2020. At the time of uploading 4041 was the most recent engine to be repainted.

On the night spanning December 30th and 31st, 2020, DC 4041 was transferred to Auckland by rail, the same process that was carried out for the other three Martinus DC’s. Then - on January 1st, 2021 - I made the crazy trip to Auckland (crazy because of how spur-of-the-moment it was) specifically to find DC 4041. Surprisingly I was successful in this quest, if you will.

At the time of uploading this re-skin - on January 30th, 2021 - I assume that DC 4041 has now been shipped to Australia, where she will continue to run as part of the Martinus Rail fleet.