DG 760 was released from Hillside in August 1978 and was placed into service as the first of an eventual ten rebuilds to be completed between 1978 and the end of the program in 1980. While the railway unions - the Locomotive Engineers Association and the EFCA - were pleased with the cab design which took into consideration their input from the early design phases, the locomotive was not as mechanically successful as it should have been. Traction motor and engine problems still occurred, as well as occasional electrical faults. The locomotives were put into service hauling freight trains on the Main South Line and occasionally the Midland Line. Although the new cabs were designed with the Otago Central Railway in mind, very few of the re-cabbed locomotives ever worked this line.