The F40PH is one of the few locomotives in North American railroad history that can be described as iconic. The F40PH represented the renaissance of passenger train travel in the United States. It was the face of Amtrak - to railfans, modelers and the public - for over 25 years. The F40PH was also used in Canada, but was not successful. However, a improved version of the F40PH, the F40PH-2 was built specifically for Via Rail and has enjoyed a successful career.

In 2010 VIA Rail Canada contracted CAD Railway Industries in Lachine, Quebec, to rebuild its F40 locomotive fleet. This involved removal of the HEP (Head End Power) alternator and installation of a separate HEP generator in the rear of the locomotive. At the same time the locomotive was given VIA's green, grey and yellow Renaissance paint scheme first seen on the P42DC locomotives in 2001. By the end of 2012 all 52 F40PH-2D locomotives had been rebuilt.

Some railfan somewhere decided to call the rebuilt locomotives F40PH-3, and other railfans followed suit. It is a completely made-up name, so that sentence is the last time you'll see Rapido use it. The correct name for the locomotive is GPA-30H. General Motors Passenger A unit, 3000 HP, class H. But nobody would know what we're talking about if we called it that so we're referring to this locomotive simply as the Rebuilt F40PH-2D.

In 2013 the Government of Canada issued a new polymer $10 banknote featuring The Canadian on the verso (back). The locomotive illustrated was number 6403 and the VIA logo was replaced by the Canada wordmark.

We're offering a special limited run of the $10 bill version of 6403, complete with the Canada wordmark. As an added bonus, 50 of the locomotives will have a crisp, uncirculated $10 bill (protected in a plastic sleeve) hidden in the box. One locomotive will include a collection of ten uncirculated $10 bills in numerical sequence!

Features:

• All-new body with different spotting details
• Fully assembled and ready to run
• Full underframe detail including piping and conduit 
• Numerous etched-metal parts including radiator grills 
• Accurate Canadian roof fans with correct number of blades 
• Full interior detail including desktop control stand 
• Available as a sound-equipped model with an ESU LokSound sound decoder or as a DC silent model
• Rapido 5-pole, skew-wound motor and silky-smooth drive system
• Macdonald-Cartier metal knuckle couplers mounted at the correct height 
• Accurate HEP generator details, including radiator fans, rads and cabling visible through the grilles
• Operating ditch lights and emergency light
• Accurate sounds recorded from a rebuilt F40PH-2D
• Emergency horn and two types of VIA E-Bell recordin