In the late 1920’s the use of the CPH railmotors were introduced on NSW country branch lines as a more efficient mode of passenger transport on the low patronage lines.  The CPH railmotors were so successful in fact they were not large enough to carry the increased passenger numbers.  As a result of this success the chief mechanical engineer started looking for a railmotor with larger passenger and luggage capacity than the CPH’s.  As a result of these investigations a railcar from the US was brought to Australia for some trials on the light branch lines of NSW.

The US railcar selected for the trial was commonly known in the US as a “doodlebug”.  These railcars as they are known in the US were introduced by many US railroad companies in the early 1900’s with some success.

In 1927 a doodlebug was brought to Australia and converted in preparation for operation in NSW.  The conversion included changing the driver control from the driver being on the left side of the cab to right hand side.  The railcar was also painted in the NSWGR colours scheme of the day of tuscan and russet.  The doodlebug maintained its US road number of 1412.

Railmotor 1412 as it was known was trialled on many of the NSW branch lines which included the line to Hay and others in the Riverina and also the branch lines in the north west of NSW to Moree and Inverell.

The trials for 1412 lasted for eleven months before it was deemed a failure in the NSW country environment.  Some six months later the doodlebug was shipped back to the US and repainted into its original railroad colours.  One of the issues with the doodlebug was that it was too heavy for the lightly constructed NSW branch lines and it slightly exceeded the NSW loading gauge which made it difficult to operation here in NSW.

After the failure of 1412 the chief mechanical engineer then engaged some of the bright new design engineers from within the NSWGR and the development of railmotor number 38 took place.  Railmotor 38, or Creamy Kate as it was became known, was much more successful and continued the tradition of the NSWGR building their own railmotors.