BR Locomotive Green

[Steamport Southport]

Discussions about colours always go the same way. There are those who argue that one or other colour is right and those who say that colours varied and you can be as flexible as you like.

 

There are those who say that you can't trust colour photos and those who say that paint starts to change first time it is out in the daylight.

 

And nobody ever comes to any firm conclusion!

 

All I will say is that the GWR didn't call their livery Brunswick Green. They called it "Middle Chrome Green" although the shade they used changed around 1928.

 

BR called their green "Dark Green" or "Dark Locomotive Green" and issued a specification under BS224 (which is a spec for a colour referred to elsewhere as Deep Bronze Green) and a web search under that number brings up samples that look just like BR Green.

 

Calling GWR or BR livery "Brunswick Green" is an error that happened some time in the past, according to one web source it may have been when the only close available paint for modellers was Humbrol Brunswick Green. People started using that paint and the name stuck.

 

The only railway I know of which really used Brunswick Green was the GCR, which used "Middle Brunswick Green" for some of its existence. There may be other pre-group liveries that used Brunswick Green but not the GWR or BR.

 

A web search came up with this, which looks a pretty good colour for BR Green to my eyes anyway!

 

https://paintman.co.uk/shop/land-rover-deep-bronze-green-lrc001/

 

The term Brunswick Green stopped being used due to it being deemed too Germanic.

 

They also stopped using the term on racing cars and called it British Racing Green instead.

 

All those other names are just new names for the same colour.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shades_of_green#Brunswick_green

 

 

 

Jason

[jonny777]

 

 

The other thing from the article concerned the days when the paint was mixed by the railways. He interviewed one of the paint shop guys from Swindon who mixed the paint. It went something on the lines of "If I had had a good night with the wife and came to work happy, everything was carefully measured as I mixed it. If she had given me a good nagging before I left home it was just thrown in."

 

 

 

I love this...

 

The human side of railway history......

Edited June 6, 2018 by jonny777

[Porcy Mane]

I love it when this debate on paint colours keeps cropping up and we find the same folk (me included) jumping in labouring their point of views.

 

So we all know there were standard paint colours along with standard instructions for mixing & application.

 

Then there were different paint manufactures/suppliers, different techniques of individual painters/sprayers, store keepers trying to stretch out dwindling supplies etc., etc., that could lead to slight variation.

 

Then let's throw into the mix, weathering, fading, light or shade, time of day, colour temperature, scale and if talking about colour photography and photographic reproduction used for reference, you can use can use the same points to argue reasons for variation.

 

We have all seen phot's where one can tell the depth of water in a locomotives tender due to the colour variation caused by condensation due to "time of day metrological conditions. Ever seen that modelled?

 

Although used in this sort of debate many times before, I used the two phots linked in my earlier post for very good reason. They show locomotives illuminated by the same and constant light source. Colour temperature and reproduction becomes irrelevant. The variation in green would be still be apparent even if the phots were reproduced in monochrome. The Colin Marsden phot shows green colour variation during application (probably but that has never been confirmed) and the 47/08 shot shows different greens due to weathering and a myriad of other reasons.

 

It's my opinion that we would be cognisant of those of those colour variations in both reality and in model form. Let's take a spotter bunking into a typical loco shed on a Sunday morning during the 1950's or 60's. If he was presented with four Brunswick locos in front of his eyes, illuminated by the same and constant light source he would see colour variation because of a combination of the reasons outlined above and elsewhere. I'd contest that if you were modelling that scene and reproduced four loco's in exactly the same shade of green it would reflect reality far less than if you introduced slight variations in your greens.

 

Unless one is modelling one of the rare events such as the Institute of Locomotive Engineers 50th anniversary at Marylebone where locos and stock had received special and excessive preparation then slight variation would probably be more accurate.

 

 

Now help me out here?

 

Which loco has the correct shade of Green?  

 

 

P

 

 

[jonny777]

I know what you are saying, but one is ex-works and the other is not. 

 

If we could find a photo of ex-works diesels and steam together; then we might be able to make a judgement. 

 

 

I know that the photos of Dick Riley might be helpful, but most established steam photographers ignored diesels (aka boxes on wheels) with a passion. 

[Wickham Green]

I know what you are saying, but one is ex-works and the other is not. 

 

If we could find a photo of ex-works diesels and steam together; then we might be able to make a judgement. 

 

 

I know that the photos of Dick Riley might be helpful, but most established steam photographers ignored diesels (aka boxes on wheels) with a passion. 

Indeed - the clean "loco has the correct shade of Green" ( subject to the limitations of the available film and reproduction on your screen ) and the steamer "has the correct shade of Green" under a layer of crud .................. unless the paintshop guy wasn't in luck the night before, of course .......

 

if you actually take the effort to read https://en.wikipedia...Brunswick_green you'll see that the various greens listed are NOT all "the same colour" - but variants within a 'Brunswick green' range.

[Clive Mortimore]

Indeed - the clean "loco has the correct shade of Green" ( subject to the limitations of the available film and reproduction on your screen ) and the steamer "has the correct shade of Green" under a layer of crud .................. unless the paintshop guy wasn't in luck the night before, of course .......

 

if you actually take the effort to read https://en.wikipedia...Brunswick_green you'll see that the various greens listed are NOT all "the same colour" - but variants within a 'Brunswick green' range.

BR did not use BS colours but its own specifications.

[Porcy Mane]

No mention of Brunswick or British Standards. But then what did Railway Pictorial & Locomotive Review know, back in the late 1940's.

 

Edited June 6, 2018 by Porcy Mane

[cctransuk]

No mention of Brunswick or British Standards. But then what did Railway Pictorial & Locomotive Review know, back in the late 1940's.

 

BR-PaintSchemes1a.jpg

 

That is an official BR document reproduced by the Railway Pictorial & Locomotive Review.

 

To BR, dark green was dark green, and could be obtained from the painters' stores - end of story.

 

If certain members wish to convince themselves that BR had two dark greens for locomotives, then let them continue to delude themselves.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

Edited June 6, 2018 by cctransuk

[PenrithBeacon]

That is an official BR document reproduced by the Railway Pictorial & Locomotive Review.

 

To BR, dark green was dark green, and could be obtained from the painters' stores - end of story.

 

If certain members wish to convince themselves that BR had two dark greens for locomotives, then let them continue to delude themselves.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

Which of the 'two' do you use on your models, John?

[Porcy Mane]

 

If certain members wish to convince themselves that BR had two dark greens for locomotives, then let them continue to delude themselves.

 

 

I wonder if there was an official instruction that was issued stating all BR green locomotives should be tarnished with the same brush.   

[t-b-g]

The term Brunswick Green stopped being used due to it being deemed too Germanic.

 

They also stopped using the term on racing cars and called it British Racing Green instead.

 

All those other names are just new names for the same colour.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shades_of_green#Brunswick_green

 

 

 

Jason

Middle Chrome Green and Brunswick Green are not two different names for the same colour. They have different BS numbers and on a colour chart they are distinctly different.

 

There is an excellent section on GWR and WR deliveries on Ian Rathbone's website and he goes into great detail including the advice to never use Brunswick Green.

 

How anybody decides what is right or wrong is beyond me but if he is happy with Land Rover Middle Chrome Green, as is Warren Haywood, quoting BS224, that will do for me.

[stewartingram]

How many times have we had this discussion before?.............

 

Stewart

[georgeT]

On class 47s l always used Brunswick green and the lighter green was Sherwood green...

[PenrithBeacon]

No mention of Brunswick or British Standards. But then what did Railway Pictorial & Locomotive Review know, back in the late 1940's.

 

...

I think there is a very good reason why this document is quoting 'Dark Green' rather than a BS number.

 

BS361 was set up in the mid-1930s to codify the colours of paint used by all government departments, military and civil. It allowed them to order, from private industry, any of their paint colours and be satisfied that they were going to get what they wanted at the price agreed between the departments and the supplier. If you like, it set up a market mechanism as well as a spec for quality. This was important at the time because it was the beginning of the re-armament programme.

 

In the late 1940s BR had only recently been set up and wasn't in any way integrated with the rest of the government machinery and, from what little I know of the era (I'm open to criticism here) it wasn't until the mid-1950s that BR was fully integrated and its paints were incorporated into BS361. This incorporation would have included giving the colour a name ie Light, Medium or Dark Brunswick Green and Dark Bronze Green and an agreement as to their composition, quality etc.

 

The fact that these paints have consecutive numbers in BS361 and it includes Dark Bronze Green (used for diesel locos) gives me the feeling that this is a consequence of the modernisation plan which also offers a date of the mid-1950s.

 

I have always thought that Swindon painted engines, ie green engines, were always a lighter colour, a more yellow shade of green, than those painted at Crewe which seemed to use a bluer shade of green. This is a circumlocutory way of saying that Swindon didn't change from its practices of GWR days, at least until the 1960s when the BR Standards at least started to appear in much the same colour as Crewe engines which I take to be Dark Brunswick Green. I think that this might have co-coincided with Raymond taking over as General Manager of the region. He also got rid of a number of other Swindon practices including painting caoches in brown and cream.

Edited June 6, 2018 by PenrithBeacon

[Nearholmer]

I love these debates/arguments. It’s about time we had the malachite one again, too.

 

What I always wonder is why, for modelling purposes, it really matters, because, presumably the game plan is to reproduce what was seen/perceived, rather than what the paint spec said, and as photos show, what could be seen varied hugely, according to many factors.

 

For the avoidance of doubt, I’m not saying that photos show ANY of the forty shades correctly, but what they do show is that there were forty shades, which allows wide latitude around whatever the centre point was.

 

Malachite was, for instance, far enough removed from BR loco green to be distinct from it, but each manifested itself as a range of colours, not one.

Edited June 6, 2018 by Nearholmer

[cctransuk]

Which of the 'two' do you use on your models, John?

 

Exclusively - Phoenix Precision P101 Post 1954 Locomotive Green.

 

To my eyes, it is spot on for steam and diesel locos during the late 50s / early 60s - which is what I model. It is applied over Halfords grey primer in all cases.

 

It has to be said that, in isolation, it can look darker on diesel locos. I believe that the orange / black / orange lining, which I apply with scale width transfers, does make the colour seem lighter on steam locos.

 

It may be relevant to point out that BR used a red oxide primer on many diesel locos - I saw quite a few running-in in this red oxide temporary finish.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

Edited June 7, 2018 by cctransuk

[Il Grifone]

It's quite possible for a different primer to result in a different final shade and I'll stay clear of the 'distance effect' applied to models....

[t-b-g]

It's quite possible for a different primer to result in a different final shade and I'll stay clear of the 'distance effect' applied to models....

Similarly the type of varnish and the number of coats applied can alter the apparent finished colour. That has been given more than once as an explanation for perceived differences between Midland, LMS and BR "Crimson Lake/Maroon" but that colour (or those colours) are even more of a matter for discussion than the green!

 

edited for stupid autocorrect!

Edited June 7, 2018 by t-b-g

[The Johnster]

I love it when this debate on paint colours keeps cropping up and we find the same folk (me included) jumping in labouring their point of views.

 

So we all know there were standard paint colours along with standard instructions for mixing & application.

 

Then there were different paint manufactures/suppliers, different techniques of individual painters/sprayers, store keepers trying to stretch out dwindling supplies etc., etc., that could lead to slight variation.

 

Then let's throw into the mix, weathering, fading, light or shade, time of day, colour temperature, scale and if talking about colour photography and photographic reproduction used for reference, you can use can use the same points to argue reasons for variation.

 

We have all seen phot's where one can tell the depth of water in a locomotives tender due to the colour variation caused by condensation due to "time of day metrological conditions. Ever seen that modelled?

 

Although used in this sort of debate many times before, I used the two phots linked in my earlier post for very good reason. They show locomotives illuminated by the same and constant light source. Colour temperature and reproduction becomes irrelevant. The variation in green would be still be apparent even if the phots were reproduced in monochrome. The Colin Marsden phot shows green colour variation during application (probably but that has never been confirmed) and the 47/08 shot shows different greens due to weathering and a myriad of other reasons.

 

It's my opinion that we would be cognisant of those of those colour variations in both reality and in model form. Let's take a spotter bunking into a typical loco shed on a Sunday morning during the 1950's or 60's. If he was presented with four Brunswick locos in front of his eyes, illuminated by the same and constant light source he would see colour variation because of a combination of the reasons outlined above and elsewhere. I'd contest that if you were modelling that scene and reproduced four loco's in exactly the same shade of green it would reflect reality far less than if you introduced slight variations in your greens.

 

Unless one is modelling one of the rare events such as the Institute of Locomotive Engineers 50th anniversary at Marylebone where locos and stock had received special and excessive preparation then slight variation would probably be more accurate.

 

 

Now help me out here?

 

Which loco has the correct shade of Green?  

 

D7004 Acton Main LineExWorks-X.jpg

 

P

 

This illustrates the point very well; the answer is that both of them do because they are both painted exactly the same colour. but the Hymek is brand new and the Castle is fairly dirty, though carries the same paint beneath the usual covering of coal and brake block dust.

[coachmann]

Meanwhile, professional model painters are painting locos in green every week and here you are putting yourselves outside the loop because you think there is something else to discover. I could paint three locos exactly the same and hand them to other modellers to photograph them and then post their photos. All will look as if they carry different greens. Even lining green locos out in different shades of orange or using thicker lines than necessary will make a difference to the appearance of the basic colour of a loco.

 

When I was commissioned to paint three 7mm LMS 'Scots' built by Geoff Holt for David Jenkinson, it was apparent when they were finished and put beside each other that one looked darker. David considered this explained why it was said LMS lake got darker in the mid 1930s. It was all down to a change of lining and insignia colour, not a change of crimson lake. It showed even on a 7mm scale loco.

 

The colours used by the RTR companies are mostly way out. But there is a risk with putting them right, and that is people then complaining that their coaches no longer match. In fact it happens already when one incorrect shade does not match another incorrect shade!

Edited June 7, 2018 by coachmann

[t-b-g]

A good friend of mine had a GWR layout with over 100 RTR locos.

A tiny handful of them actually looked right, whatever that means.

Even locos from the same manufacturer vary enormously.

When John Quick started researching his book on GCR liveries many years ago, he was in contact with a former GCR driver. The driver had no idea what the correct share of GCR green should be. He had turned up at work one day and there were 4 GCR green locos lined up and they were all different colours, even though they were freshly cleaned.

As Coachmann says, model painters with huge experience have been dealing with such matters for many years and it is not a problem that needs resolving again. There never will be a 100% accurate, cast iron answer. Just look at what such people do, find a model in a colour you like and copy it.I

Even looking at a scanned, 50 year old photo, on a computer screen, will mean that you are not seeing the actual colour the loco was, so they prove little.

Edited June 7, 2018 by t-b-g

[The Johnster]

A visit to a preserved railway with steam and diesel locos in green BR liveries won't help much either, as the high state of polish and cleanliness of such locos is very different in appearance from the normal appearance in BR service.  Even here, actual tones vary according to how recently the loco was painted and how the paint has faded. 

 

I would work to the principle that, if it says Brunswick Green on the tin, it'll be as close to the actual colour as is necessary.  I use Revell Black Green Matt, 36/40, and am happy with it.  I would seriously suggest repainting any RTR model, especially older Hornby ones, that you are not sure of the colour of, but only if you are confident about your ability to apply the lining transfers; this is a very fiddly job and, while I successfully did it years ago, I doubt I have the eyesight or steadiness of hand to do it now!  Luckily I still have some of my old models and the only loco I have in lined green, a Bachmann 4575, matches them pretty well, and all my future purchases can be in unlined black!

[Peter Kazmierczak]

And don't anyone mention Chromatic Blue....................  

[Arun Sharma]

I suspect that one of the very few locos still extant that still carries its BR-applied Brunswick/Bronze Green is 46235 City of Birmingham. Given that it is out of direct sunlight, its green looks to be pretty much as Crewe painted it - It was repainted just prior to entering preservation as it had its yellow cab stripe painted out. 

[PenrithBeacon]

No mention of Brunswick or British Standards. But then what did Railway Pictorial & Locomotive Review know, back in the late 1940's.

 

...

I have promised to do some research at TNA on this matter and yesterday I trogged down to Kew. The first file I came across was AN 157/420 which is a Southern Region file concerning locomotive liveries. There are a number of letters, memoranda, meeting agendas etc in it but one letter caught my eye was a letter dated 31st January 1949 from Riddles to Bullied concerning locomotive liveries and Riddles explicitly uses the phrase 'Dark Green (GW Shade)lined orange and black' for 'selected express passenger' locomotives.

 

Most of the rest of the file is concerning the clash between locomotive green on diesel locomotives and 'Green No 11' on rolling stock and the introduction of the yellow warning panel which the Southern management is definitely unimpressed with.

 

From the letters it is clear 'Green No 11' means something to the correspondents but it is new to me.

Edited June 14, 2018 by PenrithBeacon