MDT Mountain Diesel Transportation 1511 on property of Wyoming-Colorado Railroad Laramie, WY inoperable, operated between MDT 1510 and 1512 on tourist and freight trains until cannibalized and parked circa 1990. Still owned by Western Railroad Builders, Ogden, UT. According to previous rosters and in Sy Reich's rosters in RAILROAD Magazine, and it cross-references in both railroad's rosters, this is ex-GN 450C. A website lists this as original DRGW 555B, 2-49, builders number 5868, then DRGW 5552, then ARR 1517, then MDT 1511. I think the DRGW heritage is incorrect and it is actually ex-GN. This unit has been inoperable since circa 1990, and a coupler is missing along with the main generator, but it is still parked in Laramie as of a month ago ---- J.L. Hickey

I was up in Laramie last Saturday and just west of the UP tracks on WY 230 is an F7B unit.

It is Mountain Diesel Transportation 1511. It was used on the Wyoming and Colorado branch they bought from UP from Laramie to Walden, CO.

This unit is former Alaska RR 1517, and before that it was a DRGW F7B that the ARR purchased. I don't know its DRGW number. The ARR purchased it around 1971 added a steam generator and tall winterization hatch. It operated primarily in passenger service on the ARR from it's acquisition until the ARR sold it in 1985. So this unit had two pretty full careers. I have numerous pictures of it on the ARR, that's where I became acquainted with it.

The unit is in poor condition. I didn't have time to look closely at it to see it the prime mover, generator, and traction motors were still intact or not. I suspect it has been cannabalized for parts to keep the FP7's mentioned below alive.

The unit was brought to Laramie with ARR FP7's 1510 and 1512 (I guess that is why they renumbered it to 1511 to make a matched set). I don't know that the B unit was ever used. The A's pulled a tourist train for a couple of seasons and then were moved to the Verde Canyon Railroad in Arizona where they still pull tourist trains down there.

I didn't have a camera with me to take pictures. I will take one with me if I get back there any time soon. I suspect the future of this unit is bleak. The remainder of the former UP branch is being ripped up. It is near the remnants of what looks like a roundhouse and the tracks in there are very overgrown. Perhaps it will rust there for years, or in the scrapping of the branch they might take a torch to it. I just don't know. There was nobody around it, but a lot of rail from the salvage operation was piled up nearby. -- Jason Kuehn