STAUNTON, Va. — A piece of Baltimore & Ohio locomotive history has been preserved. The Durbin & Greenbrier Valley Railroad recently restored ex-B&O GP9 No. 6512 to its original blue and yellow paint scheme. The GP9 locomotive will be used on the Shenandoah Valley Railroad’s 20-mile short line between Staunton and Pleasant Valley in north central Virginia.
The railroad acquired the locomotive earlier this year from the Kanawha River Terminal facility in Ceredo, W.Va. The trans-loading operator purchased the locomotive directly from the Class I railroad for use in its small yard. Now, No. 6512 has been restored to reflect its original paint scheme and road number.
The locomotive was pictured outside of the Shenandoah facility in Staunton, Va. this week, displaying Durbin & Greenbrier reporting markings. The Shenandoah Valley Railroad serves numerous industries and interchanges between CSX Transportation and Norfolk Southern.
Shame, after all that hard work, using the wrong paint. At 1st thought it was C&O, even too light. Looks more like Conrail
Looks like the same blue and yellow that CSX uses. Must of got a buy on surplus paint.
Reminds me of the B&O Lionel F-3's. They got it wrong too after doing the Santa Fe & NYC perfectly.
Despite the fact that this GP-9 isn't painted in the original B&O blue & gray, as others have said, the shade of blue that it was repainted in is too light for this late 1960's paint scheme.
Blue and Gray with gold striping were the original colors of B&O GP-9's. Royal Blue was their color before merger into Chessie System. I agree with everyone commenting.
Ummm no, nowhere near the original color. And to say thats the best they can do? Any automotive paint store worth its salt can reproduce, with computers, the EXACT PAINT COLOR…heck even Ace Hardware can do that…
So no, not even close and surely no cigar either.
Nice effort but not quite right. The original paint scheme was a darker blue with stripes and "Baltimore and Ohio" spelled out beneath the stripe on the long hood. The scheme that the unit in the photo appears to try to reproduce is also a darker blue, and with a brighter yellow (for the stripe and lettering).
Conrail Blue and yellow?
Hi Dan – The railroad did admit the shade of the blue was not as 'royal' blue as what the B&O had – but it's as close as they could get with whatever circumstances/resources they had available to them. The locomotive is original B&O and this is its original number – and I think I speak for the entire forum here that it is nice to see a fallen flag represented in a way that is more fitting than its previous green/orange scheme that has no relation to B&O.
Nice! I wonder if we'll ever get to see locks painted in say, Frisco, Katy, or MP schemes on Midwestern short or regional lines?
Yes, it's an attractive paint scheme.
Yes, the blue is the wrong shade.
No, it's not the unit's original paint scheme.
So appreciate it for tidying up the locomotive, say it's "B&O-inspired", but please don't misrepresent it to anyone as "original". There are far more people who would accept a statement like that at face value than readers of this column and fans of the railroad who would know better.
The original paint scheme for B&O GP9's was royal blue with dark blue bands trimmed in gold and joined by the B&O Capital emblem. The pilots and tops of the hood and nose were grey with the cab roof black.
You have missed a treat if you have not rode in a gp9. I got to ride in one on the entire route on the Mississippi Export RR back in 1998. It was great rocking back and forth and they even let me run it for a few minutes. There was no cost either, just sign a waiver. What a great locomotive the geeps were, and still are! Hard to believe there are still a lot of them out there on short lines.
you are sure right about that Steven!
Well, more than what CSX is doing. At least it looks nice.
Hate to burst your bubble, but this is not the original scheme. Original scheme was Royal Blue with gold lettering with "Baltimore and Ohio" spelled out on the long hood. This is either the second or third scheme for this locomotive. If it was painted in sunburst after the original scheme, then this paint scheme would actually be it's third scheme, not the original. I agree, the blue is way too light, definitely not enchantment blue.
Here is link to previous photo: http://www.trainweb.org/chessiephotos/photos/GP9/6512b&o.jpg
Thanks to the Durbin and Greenbrier for doing this. The unit looks great. I always love to see classic paint schemes living on.
I think that blue is a little light; don't think this is the original color.