LYR Numberplates

[Camperdown]

I'm just getting round to painting the Barton-Wright 4-4-0 that I build many years ago.  (A Sharp Stewart loco).  Anyway, I once read that the LYR painted the outer part of loco numberplates with a colour corresponding to the loco builder.  Unfortunately, I can't find the reference, or the list of colours for the different suppliers.  Can anybody help?

[Nick Holliday]

The reference you are after is from E F Carter's book on liveries.

1876 - There was apparently a great variety in engine number-plates.  Engines built or rebuilt at Miles Platting Works had vermilion plates, some with an outer border of dark brown.  Engines built by Sharp, Stewart were dark indigo.  Those built by Kitsons were generally blue of an indigo shade, whilst those engines by the Vulcan Foundry had pale blue plates.  Neilson-built engines had chocolate-coloured plates, and those from Beyer, Peacock the same green as the locomotive bodies.

The trouble is he doesn't state his sources, and just seemed to record everything he found, without checking, so there are several contradictory entries throughout the book.  To put this one in context, there are 8 different entries for the year, which all refer to numberplates, yet none of the others mention this rainbow effect. I suspect the L&YR Society has discussed this in the past, but there doesn't seem to be anything about it in the book on L&Y locos.

[Camperdown]

Thanks Nick.  Carter is a terrible book; really it's just a collection of unedited notes for the book he didn't write.  I'm fairly sure that it wasn't Carter where I read the reference.  Perhaps it was in one of the LYR Soc's "Platform" magazines (I used to be a member).  Then again, this practice of rainbow hued plates had probably died out by the 90s, so black would be in order.  Still, indigo would look cool.

[wessy]

The book on LYR locomotives by Barry Lane states that number plates on locos were painted to indicate the builder, but he doesn't state the colours. However Nock's history of the LYR lists them as follows:

Beyer Peacock  Green

Kitson  Blue

Miles Platting  Vermillion

Neilson  Chocolate

Sharp Stewart  Indigo

Vulcan Foundry  Light blue

 

No colour was recorded for Dubs engines.

 

Presumably although the colours were applied until the opening of Horwich and the ending of the use of outside builders, the number plates would not be repainted until the loco wwas.

[Nick Holliday]

10 hours ago, wessy said:

The book on LYR locomotives by Barry Lane states that number plates on locos were painted to indicate the builder, but he doesn't state the colours. However Nock's history of the LYR lists them as follows:

Beyer Peacock  Green

Kitson  Blue

Miles Platting  Vermillion

Neilson  Chocolate

Sharp Stewart  Indigo

Vulcan Foundry  Light blue

 

No colour was recorded for Dubs engines.

 

Presumably although the colours were applied until the opening of Horwich and the ending of the use of outside builders, the number plates would not be repainted until the loco wwas.

Given that Ernest Carter’s livery book was published in 1952 and Oswald Nock’s L&YR book came out in 1969, there’s a strong possibility that OSN was merely quoting, as I did above, that single reference.  Effectively a “re-tweet” that unfortunately does not validate it.

[wessy]

And neither does it invalidate it. Such precise information is unlikely to be a complete invention, but as Barry Lane does not specify the colour, but does state that they were coloured it may be that the source is now lost. In which case no-one can prove the colour to be wrong.

 

Barry is an active participant in the LYR Society. Would not an enquiry to the Society  be more useful than a debate on here?