From Historic 60 class Photos
6029 is owned by the Australian Railway Historical Society, ACT Division and the restoration is proudly supported by their tourist operations and by the generous donations of members and public supporters.
The society operates rail tours out of Canberra with our heritage fleet of steam and diesel locomotives and rolling stock every few weeks.
To travel in style on any of our tours, or to learn more about our collection and operations, go to trains.org.au

Next Workday

Workdays are the 1st Saturday and 3rd Sunday of the month.


 The next workday will be Saturday the 3trd of March from 8am at Garratt Central(Canberra Railway Museum). New volunteers are always welcome, no skills are required, just a willingness to get dirty.

Fundraising Appeal

simple fundraisers

We need your help to put 6029 back on the rails.

$70,000 is the target we need to reach, before we can fund all the materials and services we need to complete the project. The next big ticket items on our shopping list will likely be piston and valve ringsand a new stoker trough... Don't forget about nuts, bolts and other sundry items that we buy almost every week to keep the project moving.

If you can spare a few bucks, please help us reach the target by clicking on this button.

If money is tight, why not come down and get your hands dirty instead. And remember, the more help we get, the sooner the Garratt will again grace the rails, for the enjoyment of old and young alike.

Finally I can announce that people who donate over $500 in total to Project6029, will qualify for a cab ride once 6029 is back in service. What an incentive! Anyone can qualify for this bonus, and those that have already donated are in the running. Just donate a total of $500 or more and you are in the queue...

Jun 6, 2011

Saturday 4 June 2011

The last of the top coats of black paint were applied to the top half of the hind engine unit with very pleasing results. The entire locomotive is looking almost like ex-works condition and in fact even better. The team also took time to clean down and paint the newly installed buffers. So in essence we have been from front to back in just four short years. Pity about all those bits in the middle. Now that we are again in the middle(the boiler cradle) the new drivers side cab sub floor was pre drilled using the old section as a template. A trial fit confirmed all was well and about 30 half inch holes where drill through ready for final fitting.

The brake systems rebuild was helped along with the final fitting of the flexible pipes that bridge from the engine units to the cradle. It was good to see the old replaced with new without compromise to historical design. Not much has changed in 60 years with regard to flexible hoses. The drivers side brake stand has been completely rebuilt with all new copper pipes and fittings including all four feed valves. Paul Nowland continued with the rebuild of the automatic and independent brake valves.

Gavin and new mate Tristan installed four more super heater elements. Probably not the best initiation but at least we only have sixteen to go! More tee bolts will need to be sourced before we can complete the element installation.

Alan Gardner
Posted by

How can you help 6029 get back on the rails?

This project is self funded, the workers are all volunteers, and we need your help.

Maybe you can come to Canberra on a work day and get your hands dirty, or you have a nice workshop at home and need a reason to spend more time in it.
Maybe you can't make it to Canberra, but could do a little work in Sydney, if you think you have something to offer, contact us...even if you don't think you have anything to offer, but want to be involved in preserving a litlte piece of history, contact us and we will do our best to find something interesting and productive to suit you.

Even the simplest things can help...can you spare $5 or $10 a week? it's small change on its own, but if 20 people could donate $10 a week, that would be $800 a month that we don't have now, and every dollar will help us put this monster back on the rails for everyone to enjoy.



All donations over $2 are tax deductable.