Help on BR 20t standard Brake Van paint work

[westernviscount]

Hi all,

 

A bit of reverse research here. I finished a 20t brake van as illustrated. 

It represents what i think is a change of use for the van but i wondered if anyone knew why a van would be painted in such a way. 

 

Here is a prototype example...

https://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/brbrakevan504/h41655bb

 

Many thanks

 

 

 

[giz]

I suspect that the van was originally piped and hence brown but on removal of the vacuum equipment it was partially repainted grey to indicate is changed status. A lot of brake van's were de-piped once fully fitted trains no longer routinely required one.

[jim.snowdon]

11 hours ago, giz said:

I suspect that the van was originally piped and hence brown but on removal of the vacuum equipment it was partially repainted grey to indicate is changed status. A lot of brake van's were de-piped once fully fitted trains no longer routinely required one.

Were BR particularly worried about distinguishing unfitted stock from fitted stock using colour by then? My recollections are that towards the end of using unfitted stock the rules about grey/bauxite seemed to have broken down, with bauxite being used rather indiscriminately as a default colour.

 

Jim

[giz]

42 minutes ago, jim.snowdon said:

Were BR particularly worried about distinguishing unfitted stock from fitted stock using colour by then? My recollections are that towards the end of using unfitted stock the rules about grey/bauxite seemed to have broken down, with bauxite being used rather indiscriminately as a default colour.

 

Jim

A lot of de-piped brake vans appear to have had some grey daubed on them, not sure why because, as you say, the distinction was becoming rather blurred by then.

However, ISTR that some of the unfitted wagons which were built in Freight Brown were overpainted grey as well.

[Yardman]

Most likely Bauxite paint was all they had available at the time a repair was made. from early 60's all stock was to be painted bauxite irrespective of whether it was fitted or not. However this proved unworkable as it was no longer easy to differentiate between fitted and unfitted stock and bauxite painted unfitted stock got put in fitted trains. So unfitted stock reverted to be painted grey, but not before many bauxite painted examples had escaped. This was just into the TOPS era so lettering was not usually the same as on the van shown.

It should be noted the paint colours were not the same shade as used previously, but as with most things on British Railways this was not always the case at some depots. It depended on how much old paint they had in stock.

[westernviscount]

Hi folks. Many thanks for the responses. I suspected it represented a change and it appeared the grey is overpainting the bauxite. Mine was the other way around. 

 

I understand the pre-TOPS lettering however i am going to go with the assumption it was de-piped in the very late 60's early 70's. 

 

Thanks again.