When D&H started operating trains on the Columbia & Port Deposit, the 13 585’s soon proved to not be enough power. The plan was to finish the electrification up to Schenectady (400 miles, give or take, so only about 300 million in 1984 dollars, real soon now, but alas Conrail would not budge on letting the D&H string wire over the Sunbury gap; by the time this actually happened the railroad was on the hook for about $900 million … thank goodness that PV&T revenues were up to class 1 levels and loans could be made to cover it) and use some newly built AC or multisystem power, so to cover the gap between now and the electrification a small handful of motors were leased; a (the) GM6C and a (the) GM10B from Electro-Motive, and a small collection of modified GG1’s leased from Conrail & the Leatherstocking Railway Historical Society.

The original transformers on these GG1s were cooled with a PCB-laden fluid, which made maintenance problematic, so 4 of these motors (CR 4884, 4887, 4879, and 4897) were shipped up to Portland to have their old transformers replaced with newer (& smaller) ones.

Three of the motors went back to Harrisburg in their old PC CR black patchpaint, but #4897 was in a sorry enough (cosmetic) shape to require a detour through the paint shop before returning home.

These units served for about 20 years before frame cracking caught up to them and forced a second retirement – 4887 & 4889 were then returned to Conrail Norfolk Southern, which then scrapped them, CACV 4932 & 4934 were returned to Cooperstown Junction (4934 on it’s own wheels, 4932 disassembled and sent back in pieces), and 4884 & 4897 were purchased by the PV&T for the museum fleet.

(#4932 was not simply dumped at Cooperstown Junction, but reassembled when it got there.)

The rebuilt units can be differentiated from the stock(ish) PRR units by having their boilers removed and having service hatches cut into the center of the carbody when the old transformers were pulled out.