The South Eastern Railway (1836-1899) Livery colours

[Stoat's Nest]

Has anyone modelled the South Eastern Railway? It merged with the London Chatham & Dover Railway in 1899 to form the SE&CR. The shade of loco green is a problem since Precision paints appear to have never heard of the SER and they never put colour representations of many of these colours on their website anyway and Railmatch aren't helpful either. As a watercolour artist, I would describe the shade of green as Deep Cupric green or Brominated Pthalocyanine, which will have lots of you scratching your heads. It's a sort of bluish green and is also called Holly Green, but holly bushes can vary an awful lot in the greens they display, especially the ones with variegated leaves.  The valencing on the outside frames is painted a muddy sort of crimson; also no match in Precision or Railmatch, so I think it'll be a case of getting the pipettes out and then a bit of trial and error mixing. SER loco lining was black flanked by two white lines: some firm must produce these transfers in 4mm.

 

I'm toying with the idea of an area somewhere between Croydon and Redhill where the SER and the Brighton waged war over running rights until the latter opened the Quarry line c. 1900.  A bit further north  near the East Croydon/Fairfield area and the LNWR appears: suburban services via the West London Extension Line to Croydon.  Horse racing events, very popular from the middle of the 19th century, were catered for by the Brighton, at Epsom, Tattenham and Plumpton. Below is a rake of Horseboxes being towed by a Webb Coal tank through Clapham Junction, on the way to one of these race meetings. 

A Webb Coal tank hauling a rake of mixed horseboxes southward through Clapham Junction to race meetings in the south.

 

 

 

SER loco green livery and lining and the frame colour.

Edited December 18, 2019 by Stoat's Nest
added jpg

[Skinnylinny]

I have to admit, I just miss modelling the SER (my period starts at 1900), but I would like some SER stock (possibly even still in SER livery - how quickly were they repainted?) as the section of SECR that hits my layout area is ex-SER. 

SERKits provide kits in 7mm scale, though as a 4mm modeller I've not really looked at their offerings. They do have some nice colour photographs of their kits built up in SER livery, and offer CAD drawings of various rolling stock and locos, which may be of interest.

In terms of finding suitable lining, and indeed in terms of colours, it might be worth asking in the Pre-Grouping section on the forum - I've found it a particularly welcoming  (and knowledgeable and informative!) group. 

Edited December 17, 2019 by Skinnylinny

[Stoat's Nest]

I've looked at the SERkits site and though mainly 7mm, he offers scaled down etches only, of some of his kits and drawings in 3.5mm and 4mm.  Unlike some etched brass kits from other makers, SERkits  offerings seem to be a bit of a scavenger hunt requiring not just the usual wheel set, axles, motor, gears and pickups etc. but loads of bits of lost wax parts available, that might  be in stock, from a wide variety of different suppliers and which need modifying to be in scale with the rest of the model. The site itself doesn't seem to have been updated since 2017 so, I'll need to contact him about the state of play with projected 4mm projects.

 

 

thanks

[Nearholmer]

I think there is to be an HMRS book on the topic, but until then, this is good as a start point for liveries, although superseded by later research in hyper-detail.

 

The GER also ran to Croydon BTW, and was Tottenham really served by the LBSC? I thought it was GER and Midland. Tattenham Corner, part of the Epsom Course, had an SER station.

 

Other LBSC racecourses off the top of my head: Brighton; Gatwick; Goodwood.

 

 

Edited December 17, 2019 by Nearholmer

[Compound2632]

I was under the impression that South Eastern Railway locomotive livery was black, at least in the 1890s, just prior to the formation of the Management Committee.

 

Also, my understanding is the the SECR followed SER livery for carriages and wagons, at least initially, i.e. claret for the former and red lead for the latter.

 

But it's only on the wagons that I'm really confident.

 

One of my fantasy layouts would depict Earley to Loddon Bridge, c. 1899 - South Eastern and South Western.

[phil_sutters]

8 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

I think there is to be an HMRS book on the topic, but until then, this is good as a start point for liveries, although superseded by later research in hyper-detail.

 

The GER also ran to Croydon BTW, and was Tottenham really served by the LBSC? I thought it was GER and Midland. Tattenham Corner, part of the Epsom Course, had an SER station.

 

Other LBSC racecourses off the top of my head: Brighton; Gatwick; Goodwood.

 

 

and Plumpton

[Nearholmer]

SECR carriage livery was ‘lake’ meaning dark wine red, as per the Pullman car ‘topaz’ in the NRM, which I think was also SER livery, but they did have a few coaches in lake and teak for a while, when some ex-LCDR stock was painted up to the waist only.

[Nearholmer]

The OP already mentioned Epsom and Plumpton.

 

I have an inkling that Lewes might have had a course too, and there were ‘hunt races’, one day each year affairs, at several places in the Weald - Eridge hunt races survived until possibly the 1970s, I certainly went to watch as a child in the early 1960s.

[Nile]

3 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

I was under the impression that South Eastern Railway locomotive livery was black, at least in the 1890s, just prior to the formation of the Management Committee.

Info from Bradley's loco's of the SER:

The black livery was applied to new builds from 1883 - 1898. Older locos continued to carry their original livery - dark green (pass) or sea green (goods).

The B class of 1898-9 carried a bluish-green livery, lined out in red and yellow. This faded badly and was difficult to clean.

[Stoat's Nest]

On 17/12/2019 at 15:08, phil_sutters said:

and Plumpton

 

"The GER also ran to Croydon BTW, and was Tottenham really served by the LBSC?" 

The dreaded predictive text algorithm was at work again: woe to those who don't watch what they type with hawk like diligence. I intended to write Tattenham, which the algorithm has never heard of and ended up in Crewe, not Tottenham. "Oh, mr Porter, whatever shall I do?"  etc.

Edited January 23, 2020 by Stoat's Nest

[Stoat's Nest]

On 17/12/2019 at 15:08, phil_sutters said:

and Plumpton

 

"The GER also ran to Croydon BTW, and was Tottenham really served by the LBSC?" 

The dreaded predictive text algorithm was at work again: woe to those who don't watch what they type with hawk like diligence. I intended to write Tattenham, which the algorithm has never heard of and ended up in Crewe, not Tottenham. "Oh, mr Porter, whatever shall I do?"  etc.

 

I've not found any photographic evidence of the GER at Croydon (New Croydon station on the 1898 six inch map) but there is a rather grainy photo of the entrance to the Fairfield yard (LBSCR) which Klaus Marx says closed in 1890 with a LNWR 2-4-2T tank and carriages returning north from the yard. On the 1914 map the yard it's still there with at least 6 buildings and more lines to serve them (see map).

 

New Croydon station 1898 and Fairfield (Goods) yard.

Edited January 23, 2020 by Stoat's Nest

[Nearholmer]

The photo that I think you are referring to showing an LNWR train at Fairfield Yard is included on 'Disused Stations' for Central Croydon http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/c/central_croydon/index6.shtml , as are summaries of the GE workings, and although I've never seen a photo of a GER at Croydon there is plenty of timetable evidence, and several photos of GER trains carrying 'Croydon' destination boards, but not snapped at Croydon itself.

 

James Petts had a thread on here recently that got deeply into very similar territory to that which you are exploring, and there is a very good if moribund thread called "Umber is the New Black", which looked in detail at the SER services as far as Redhill, and explored the Purley/Caterham/Tattenham services a bit too.

 

Fairfield Yard I think faded-out very slowly, finally disappearing under the BR(S) Central Division GM's HQ, Essex House, and a multi-storey car park, in the late-1960s/early-1970s. It was  Central Croydon that was decisively expunged by the Town Hall, and I think the route between Fairfield Yard and Town Hall Gardens was roofed-over to become an underground car park when the Fairfield Halls were built or sometime thereafter (it always used to intrigue me that there were ornamental ponds at surface level, with fish in them, and below was a car park).

 

You really might be better transferring to the "pre-grouping" section, because it is usually lively with discussion of through workings, especially south of Central London...... those who "hang out" there love all this stuff!

 

Kevin

Edited December 18, 2019 by Nearholmer

[PenrithBeacon]

On 17/12/2019 at 13:43, Stoat's Nest said:

Has anyone modelled the South Eastern Railway? ...

http://southeasternandchathamrailway.org.uk/

 

These folk do! The RCTS book on SER locos describes the green as 'Prussian Green' and I believe it causes a lot of controversy within the society.

Cheers 

[Guy Rixon]

SECR coach lake is thought to have been the same colour as SER lake until about 1912, when the shade was changed. Exactly what colour this was is not clear, but I think the paint on the Bachmann SECR coaches is a reasonable guess. The two big changes in coach livery (apart from the "khaki top" coaches already noted, which livery lasted on a few months) was that the SECR introduced large class-numbers on the doors and stopped lining out the NPCS.

 

The "muddy brown" on the engine valences is Indian Red and was also used by the SECR; it's in the Precision range.

[John Arkell]

The latest edition of the South Eastern & Chatham Railway Society journal 'Invicta' issue 94 contains the first part of Geoff Stenner's article on the locomotive livery of the SER. In Previous issues John Kingsland has chronicled the liveries of the London Chatham & Dover Railway locomotives, carriages and wagons. In due course it is planned to collate all the livery information for the HMRS to publish in its series of livery registers for the Southern Railway area.

 

John Arkell