Locomotive J515 was built at the Vulcan Foundry, the United Kingdom in 1950’s as part of the Victorian Railways plan, “Operation Phoenix”. 

The J Class was seen to be an evolution of the then-current Victorian Railways K class steam locomotive and was provisioned to be gauge converted in the future. 60 of the Class was built, with 30 being coal burners and 30 being oil burners. 

The J class was virtually the next and last branch line mixed uses steam locomotive that would serve the Victorian Railways well until the EMD G8 (Victorian Railways T Class) replaced them in a bid for dieselisation a year later, but majority of the fleet would last as long as 1972.  

In 1983, the Seymour Loco Steam Preservation Group (now SRHC) acquired the locomotive and took 5 years to restore to mainline uses. In 1988, the J was back up running again, with 515 roaming around the entire broad gauge Victorian Railways network but always frequented the Albury Line before its standard gauge conversion in 2008. 

Since 2015, J515 is undergoing a comprehensive restoration to bring it back once again into mainline condition. The locomotive has since had its smokebox replaced and various other work completed. 

With its distinctive German-inspired red smoke defectors and high boiler arrangement, the locomotive type was known for being quintessential and quite an iconic piece of Victorian Railways history.