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Lively Liveries


844fan

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Ok heres a question I've been searching for the answer to. I want to have my locomotives even though based on a fictional setting to have some connection to real life and not be painted in a livid pink   :lol: but a more realistically minded livery.

 

Anyone know of a reference to steam locomotive livery out there? I know of a few GNR, LMS, Highland and Caladonian colors and they are a decent start but theres a lot of blue and red in that lot.

 

Any ideas? 

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You could have different shades of the red, blue or green. you can go for brown (GNoSR) or umber/mustard (M&GNJR) or Stroudley's 'improved' locomotive green.

I have heard of documents that state the chosen livery for British Railways (in 1948)was going to be Post Office Red - but the Post Master General objected.

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You could have different shades of the red, blue or green. you can go for brown (GNoSR) or umber/mustard (M&GNJR) or Stroudley's 'improved' locomotive green.

I have heard of documents that state the chosen livery for British Railways (in 1948)was going to be Post Office Red - but the Post Master General objected.

Now that would be a sight to see. Be like having a School bus yellow livery here in the US only it wouldn't be schools getting in a huff.

 

Ah true enough there are many shades of color. I suppose as long as I be sensible on picking the color and stay away from any neon colors I should be fine.

 

I do want to ask has there ever been a purple livery on UK metals? I know a few engines in India and the US have but not sure if it was ever even heard of on UK steam.

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An unusual but not unique combination would be light blue for passenger locos hauling mahogany coaching stock, black for freight and mixed traffic classes. Railcars and railbuses dark blue and cream. This combination was used on the GNR (Ireland)

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  • 2 weeks later...

The MGWR of Ireland had some of their, "A Class" (Celtic) locos in a rather nice-looking shade of dark blue.

http://www.steamindex.com/media/celtic.jpg

To go with it, a group of their coaches (mostly bogies from what I understand, but some were 6-wheelers) carried the same dark blue but with upper panels highlighted in cream with black and straw(/gold?) lining. Sources appear to vary on how long they had this livery (I think from either 1901-05 or 1901-15)  for or how many got it, but the remains of some of the blue can be seen on one of the MGWR coaches at Downpatrick railway. The shade was probably similar to what's on MGWR 47, "The Dargan Saloon," which is at Cultra. Blue could be seen again on the isolated Waterford and Tramore line until about 1925 - their first class coaches were dark blue with orange frames (similar to an, "Irn Bru," bottle, perhaps!)

 

Another interesting livery from Ireland went onto CIÉ's new diesels in the 1950s - the A, Sulzer (B101), C, E(401) and G(601) class locomotives carried it, under frames covered and all! Similarly, the new, "Laminate," coaches of 1956-7 also had this livery, which gave way to the well known green from 1958. This silver rolling stock pattern was deviated from in an odd way by the GM 121 class locos that were introduced in 1962, which arrived in grey with yellow logos, numbers, and wasp stripes on the cowcatcher/bufferbeam things.

Of course, we can't forget the famous, "SuperTrain," livery of the '70s, orange/brown with black stripes! :D

 

Apart the CBSCR (green), and GSWR (brown or purple lake and cream - see GSWR 836 and 1097 at Downpatrick), I'm quite sure that maroon was on all coaches of the relatively large railway companies in the Republic directly prior to the 1925 GSR amalgamation.

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The MGWR of Ireland had some of their, "A Class" (Celtic) locos in a rather nice-looking shade of dark blue.

http://www.steamindex.com/media/celtic.jpg

To go with it, a group of their coaches (mostly bogies from what I understand, but some were 6-wheelers) carried the same dark blue but with upper panels highlighted in cream with black and straw(/gold?) lining. Sources appear to vary on how long they had this livery (I think from either 1901-05 or 1901-15)  for or how many got it, but the remains of some of the blue can be seen on one of the MGWR coaches at Downpatrick railway. The shade was probably similar to what's on MGWR 47, "The Dargan Saloon," which is at Cultra. Blue could be seen again on the isolated Waterford and Tramore line until about 1925 - their first class coaches were dark blue with orange frames (similar to an, "Irn Bru," bottle, perhaps!)

 

Another interesting livery from Ireland went onto CIÉ's new diesels in the 1950s - the A, Sulzer (B101), C, E(401) and G(601) class locomotives carried it, under frames covered and all! Similarly, the new, "Laminate," coaches of 1956-7 also had this livery, which gave way to the well known green from 1958. This silver rolling stock pattern was deviated from in an odd way by the GM 121 class locos that were introduced in 1962, which arrived in grey with yellow logos, numbers, and wasp stripes on the cowcatcher/bufferbeam things.

Of course, we can't forget the famous, "SuperTrain," livery of the '70s, orange/brown with black stripes! :D

 

Apart the CBSCR (green), and GSWR (brown or purple lake and cream - see GSWR 836 and 1097 at Downpatrick), I'm quite sure that maroon was on all coaches of the relatively large railway companies in the Republic directly prior to the 1925 GSR amalgamation.

That blue is quite close to the Caladonian Railway's Passenger Livery. It is a nice shade of blue.

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I do want to ask has there ever been a purple livery on UK metals? I know a few engines in India and the US have but not sure if it was ever even heard of on UK steam.

BR did experiment with purple in the early days as an alternative to express passenger blue - I don't know the full range of locos so painted, but there is definitely a picture somewhere of an A4 in purple

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Probably the oddest livery was that applied to the LNWR Greater Britain class Queen Empress in 1897 for the Queen's Jubilee. The basic livery was white, albeit with a creamy tinge that might have been caused by the varnish. The white panels were bordered in a colour which had various descriptions, but often called lavender or lilac, and the polished brass boiler bands were also bordered with lavender. Unsurprisingly it only lasted from May to October, whilst it's companion, Great Britain, was painted in scarlet and lined with real gold leaf, lasted a bit longer.

The London Tilbury and Southend Railway also had a lavender livery, used on their tanks which also carried names on the tank.

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