NER Livery

[Edwardian]

As you know, I have a long term interest in depicting Richmond and also Cawood. As a result, I have a number of NER locos that require painting. Yet NER Saxony green is proving surprisingly elusive. 

 

The issue, for me, has been further confused by the fact that Bachmann, via the TMC-commissioned O Class, advances the proposition that the NER painted its locos in a shade of radioactive vomit.

 

Now, clearly the pre-Grouping forum is the only place where a sensible attempt to elucidate this issue may be made. The trade and products forum is generally cluttered with contrarianism, Govites ("we've all had enough of experts"), and people too invested in the shiny new product they've bought to be objective. Besides, if I see yet another picture of the preserved H Class in bright sunlight posted to show, yes, Saxony green is yellow sick-coloured, I think I'll scream.

 

So, I thought I'd try an experiment suggested by this book:

 

 

It has an appendix with colour swatches: 

 

 

Now, if you have an idea of what NER Saxony green looks like, before reading further, choose a number from the image above before reading on.

 

What really attracted my attention, though, was this instruction:

 

 

Normal daylight?

 

Well, I reckoned that this morning hereabouts, a partially cloudy day, was about as normal daylight as yet get, so, Exhibit A: Normal Daylight:

 

 

And the answer to what Mr Carter thinks is NER green? I bet you didn't guess, it's No.7:

 

 

 

So this, and all the images in this post (save the last), have been taken outdoors, in quick succession under the same 'normal daylight' conditions.

 

Which brings us to our other colour swatch. This time it's from North Eastern Record vol.3 and is said to represent the green used in 1925 as Saxony green to restore the Tenant. 

 

 

 

Hmm...

 

So here is Mr Carter's painting, not at all looking like his No.7 swatch:

 

 

 

 

Here is the contemporary model pictured in the Record:

 

 

 

 

 

Here is my Class 290 model:

 

 

 

 

And here is the Bachmann model:

 

 

Normal daylight, remember

 

 

 

And altogether now:

 

 

 

The reference to 'Tenant Model' is to one held in the York warehouse and said to be dated c.1890, so another contemporary source.  There is a picture online:

 

 

So that's really not helpful

 

 

 

Edited July 3, 2023 by Edwardian

[Schooner]

Reading on a heavily red-shifted screen so have even less of use to contribute than usual, but feel if should be recorded that

1 hour ago, Edwardian said:

the NER painted its locos in a shade of radioactive vomit.

made me laugh not only out loud, but with such panache that members of the household felt the need to come to my immediate aid in case I required professional medical help. Ta :)

 

A note of caution re contemporary models. The temptation is to view them as gospel - after all, what source could be better? - but I've learned from my own area of particular interest that there were just as many muppets back in the day as there are now, perfectly capable of making equally egregious errors.

 

[Edwardian]

The yellow sickness is virulent.

 

 

I have an excuse for an H Class, inasmuch as one seems to have been used during the construction of the Catterick Camp railway in 1915 and shedded at Richmond. I suspect the loco would have been in lined black by then, so will want to order this:

 

 

I do not need another, but one in W Worsdell green would fit in generally with the 1900s NER representation I was attempting. The Rapido version is 'as preserved', which is not fully lined as it would have been, so I was planning to put mu 3D print one into this livery.

 

I would, however, have gone for the Rapido one in T W livery, an RTR first for this livery, but not, I fear, if it is going to go the same way as Bachmann with the green.

 

Interestingly, Hattons' website has more of a 'normal daylight' take on the preserved loco:

 

 

So, part of the problem is (a) I don't know how reliable this preservation era interpretation is, and (b) any known reasonably reliable rendition of NER Saxony green that I have seen has been indoors. These would be the Tenant (paint shade determined in 1925, but query if faded or repainted since, and (b) the M1 with its careful 1945 Darlington restoration.  Someone made this point on the O Class forum, that said, the Tenant sits below the North Road skylights and the M1 I have always photographed in her position alongside Locomotion's plate glass windows, so neither is gloomy museum lighting,  

 

Views of the Tenant and colour patches taken from the pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Above is the Tenant, and patches taken from my pictures of it, and below from top to bottom are my pictures of:

 

(a) Its swatch in the Record reflecting light:

 

 

(b) one of same body patches from Tenant seen above, but increasing the saturation of the image

 

 

(c) Its swatch in the Record, same lighting conditions outside as the first, but no catching the sun's reflections so much  :

 

 

It seems to me that add some saturation to the Tenant sample and you end up with an image somewhere between the two pictures of the swatch. 

 

And here are some pictures, and patches from my pictures, of the M1:

 

Here the splasher is caught in the full glare of the window:

 

 

 

Same day and time, here there are patches of the tender in relative shade:

 

 

 

 

[MarkC]

I too laughed at the "radioactive vomit" comment - Chapeau, sir. Chapeau...

 

But on a more serious note - what a fascinating piece of research you've done. Very, very interesting. Thank you. Chapeau again...

 

Now to look more closely at the several locomotives presently awaiting their coats of Saxony Green in my paint shop...

 

Mark

Edited July 3, 2023 by MarkC

[RichardT]

On 01/07/2023 at 22:53, Edwardian said:

Besides, if I see yet another idiot post a picture of the preserved H Class in bright sunlight and claim that, yes, Saxony green is yellow sick-coloured, I think I'll scream.

@Edwardian You’ve posted a very interesting bit of practical research, and so it’s sad that you felt the need to include the gratuitous insult above. Especially as you’ve (of course) deliberately mischaracterised what I said over in the TMC thread.

 

But that’ll do from me.

 

Yrs,

Another Idiot

[Edwardian]

39 minutes ago, MarkC said:

I too laughed at the "radioactive vomit" comment - Chapeau, sir. Chapeau...

 

But on a more serious note - what a fascinating piece of research you've done. Very, very interesting. Thank you. Chapeau again...

 

Now to look more closely at the several locomotives presently awaiting their coats of Saxony Green in my paint shop...

 

Mark

 

Thank you, Mark. I really do not know where this will take me to. 

 

13 minutes ago, RichardT said:

@Edwardian You’ve posted a very interesting bit of practical research, and so it’s sad that you felt the need to include the gratuitous insult above. Especially as you’ve (of course) deliberately mischaracterised what I said over in the TMC thread.

 

But that’ll do from me.

 

Yrs,

Another Idiot

 

Happy to apologise for offence  evidently given. If it helps, I had not you or any individual in mind and was really railing against what I saw as the recurring false logic of relying on one particular lighting condition to sell the Bachmann shade.  Yes, on reflection that was not a good thing to have said. Allow me to make some amends.

 

I am not convinced by the Bachmann shade, but it does not follow I feel I have all, or any, of the answers.  I agree, as it happens, with the caller who thinks my A Class is an outlier. It is. Hence this attempt to nose my way through the references I can find. 

 

In other news Adrian Marks emailed me.  I know that he entertains severe reservations on the subject of Mr Carter's scholarship at times. We had been discussing GER coach brown, for instance. 

 

So, I will say that I am trying to hold off judgments and concisions for the time being, yet, as regards Carter, I accept his swatch shade appears unlikely, however, this exercise is one of taking into account 'a range of views' and I also wanted to try out his colour value perception method. 

 

Adrian also reminds of the suggestion that Darlington tended to blue and York to yellow. Again, it's something I've referred to a few times now, but on this topic I have not yet, because I did not feel I was in a position yet to apply this to any colour variation I was seeing. I'm still not sure how relevant that knowledge may prove. For instance, if you think that there may be a difference between 1463 and 1621's shades, the former, a Darlington engine, was restored in the 1920s to Tenant livery, but I don't know where. The M1, 1621, a Gateshead engine, was restored in 1945 at Darlington.

 

Ultimately Adrian suggests I try to recreate the recipe for Saxony green, mixing equal parts of Prussian blue and medium chrome yellow. Of course, it depends on the paint and then, of course, this takes no account of how locos were painted, rubbed down, re-coated etc and varnished, but, having exhausted where I think images of colour samples will get us ..... 

[Caley Jim]

I cannot comment on the colour under discussion, but bear in mind that we all perceive colour differently. The physiology of the colour receptors in the retina and how the brain interprets the signals from them via the optic nerve all play a part, irrespective of the lighting conditions. 

 

Jim

[Edwardian]

1 hour ago, Caley Jim said:

I cannot comment on the colour under discussion, but bear in mind that we all perceive colour differently. The physiology of the colour receptors in the retina and how the brain interprets the signals from them via the optic nerve all play a part, irrespective of the lighting conditions. 

 

Jim

 

I know, but I must paint the engines in something!

 

As you know me, you know I am the first one to caution against trying to be definitive in claiming what a correct colour is and then reproducing it on a model. So many variables. 

[Edwardian]

NER green is supposed to be "Saxony green". Late Fletcher is Saxony green with dark green borders. McDonnell changed the livery, but the Tenant committee restored Saxony green, but without the dark green borders.  T W Worsdell retained Saxony green, but restored borders, this time in claret. Wilson Worsdell's again is described as a Saxony green livery a, but he dispensed with the borders. 

 

So, first point, from at least Fletcher's time to Grouping, with the exception of the McDonnell period, all NER locomotives are supposedly and, I think, officially, Saxony green. Does that mean I am satisfied this was a definite colour, entirely unchanging? Of course not, but it would be hard to pin this shade down at all, let alone to chart any changes to it.

 

As, again, I have often mentioned, the different Works seem to have had different takes on it. In North Eastern Record, vol.3, in the context of the Fletcher era, the comment is made "Even during the T W Wordsell era, and beyond":

 

- Gateshead used Saxony green

- Darlington's shade of green is said to have had a blue tinge

- York used a green colour with a yellow tinge

 

I read this as implying that Saxony green proper was what Gateshead did, Darlington straying to the blue side of it and York to the yellow.  It is, perhaps, further implied that, post-Fletcher, things were becoming gradually a bit more standardised. 

 

It seems to me that the best thing to do is to try to recreate Saxony green before worrying about whether it needs a nudge to blue or to yellow. If it looks like a reasonable shade, then perhaps it will need taking down with a little white, as the prototype shade would no doubt need lightening a little for a 4mm scale model.    

 

So, the references to the composition of NER Saxony green are:

 

The Record, citing R H Inness as noting that NER green was mixed from equal parts of Prussian blue and middle Chrome yellow.  So I am not sure there is even an official record of how Saxony green was created. Hoole in An Illustrated History notes that "very few official details of NER locomotive liveries have survived". There are some "costs sheets", but if the example he gives (G1 2-4-0s in 1887-8) is anything to go by, these are not much help by giving the cost of "sundry coloured paint".  We do know the engines were given three coats of paint and one of varnish, however.

 

So, R H Inness's note is what we have.

 

Adrian kindly referred me to George Terry's warning of the effects of adulterants on the pigments in his 1893 tome Paints, Pigments & Painting:

 

Prussian Blue.—This blue owes its colour to a combination of iron and ferrocyanogen. The commercial products vary very much in tint, depth of colour, covering power, and solubility. They are used for a variety of purposes, nearly all of which require the blue to have some property different from what it should have for other uses. For some purposes a green shade blue is wanted, for others a violet shade blue; some users want the blue to be soluble in water, others for it to be soluble in oxalic acid, others require it to be insoluble.  For all the ordinary uses of a pigment Prussian blue is quite durable, and possesses a depth of colour and a definite tint which is proof against the destructive agencies of light and air; and though its covering powers are not great, it is one of the most important blue pigments in use.

 

Chrome Yellows.—A very important family of yellow pigments are the “chromes,” consisting mainly of chromic acid in combination with lead, iron, or zinc. Chromates of lead...are produced by precipitating a lead salt with a salt of chromic acid, and the difference in tint is owing to the different quantity of the chromic acid which is present in the salt. The orange chrome is a basic chromate of lead, and basic chromate of lead contains more of the chromic acid than is present in the lemon chrome. The lightest chrome contains some sulphate of lead precipitated with the chromate. All these colours contain lead, and are therefore liable to the influence of sulphuretted hydrogen. Now, if a chromate of lead [has been] adulterated, [brought] down with whiting, and so forth...the chrome loses its body; if it is brought down with lead sulphate it has more body. [T]he preparation of chrome yellow presents difficulties in practice, because products differing in shade and structure, although of uniform chemical composition, are obtained according to modifications of the method of manufacture or nature of materials employed. A special difficulty is the turning of colour, whereby a “turned” yellow has a dirty orange-yellow colour, which when mixed with barytes gives a yellowish-brown leather-coloured shade and not a light pure yellow. Other derived colours are similarly affected.

 

Here are the modern pigments:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 3, 2023 by Edwardian
spelling

[Schooner]

More interesting stuff, thanks for sharing. The two quotes from the latest cover the whole issue nicely:

2 hours ago, Edwardian said:

"The commercial products vary very much in tint, depth of colour, covering power, and solubility."

7 hours ago, Edwardian said:

 

 

So the target is moving, as there was significant tonal variation in the real thing from new and as the locos aged, and we're calling shots via Trigger-Pulling Committee, who, even when working from a single modern repro as in the photo above, must pick one of the perceived colours and then choose how to represent that colour at scale.

 

 🤢

 

Justifying what convinces falls into the Too Hard category and I find myself happy to roll with gut feel!

Edited July 3, 2023 by Schooner

[Edwardian]

5 minutes ago, Schooner said:

More interesting stuff, thanks for sharing. The two quotes from the latest cover the whole issue nicely:

 

So the target is moving, as there was significant tonal variation in the real thing from new and as the locos aged, and we're calling shots via Trigger-Pulling Committee, who, even when working from a single modern repro as in the photo above, must pick one of the perceived colours and then choose how to represent that colour at scale.

 

 🤢

 

Justifying what convinces falls into the Too Hard category and I find myself happy to roll with gut feel!

 

Yes, bit of a b*gger all round, but one must try nonetheless to find something that looks the part!

[Caley Jim]

Whatever colour you paint it, if someone comes along and tells you categorically that you are wrong, then your response is 'prove it!' and the only acceptable evidence as proof is a flake of the original paint!

 

Jim

[33C]

 I think i used a Humbrol Forest Green for the long boiler and Precision apple green for the O class. That was a nightmare matching a colour using the photographs i had in front of me. But, they look "North Eastern"! 

[cctransuk]

44 minutes ago, Caley Jim said:

Whatever colour you paint it, if someone comes along and tells you categorically that you are wrong, then your response is 'prove it!' and the only acceptable evidence as proof is a flake of the original paint!

 

Jim

 

..... which will have faded out of all recognition, anyway!

 

CJI.

[Edwardian]

2 minutes ago, Caley Jim said:

Whatever colour you paint it, if someone comes along and tells you categorically that you are wrong, then your response is 'prove it!' and the only acceptable evidence as proof is a flake of the original paint!

 

Jim

 

Agree. Certitude is impossible. Perfection is illusory. It just has to look better than radioactive vomit!

 

So, on with this Fool's Errand!

 

I have ordered some oil paints (1) bog standard Windsor & Newton and (2) some handmade posh stuff. 

 

Now, chrome yellow pigment, I read, is not used in modern paints. It was a thing in the Nineteenth Century and Van Gogh and the Impressionists loved it. The trouble was, it was not stable, so the brilliant yellows it yielded darkened. It was for this reason that it started to be superseded by Cadmium yellow once that came along.

 

So, query, if your locomotive green is made using chrome yellow, will it be prey to darkening over time?

 

Windsor & Newton do a 'chrome yellow'. The posh stuff is a blend of pigment specifically mixed to be"redolent" of the old Nineteenth Century "Chrome Yellow Middle":

 

 

As for Prussian blue, I read, was created in the early 18th century and is the first modern synthetic pigment. Its significance was as the first stable and relatively light-fast blue pigment to be widely used. 

 

The Windsor & Newton seems to be the colour I would expect. The posh stuff, though, looks all but black:

 

 

Thus, we had light-fast blue mixed with a yellow that was not stable at the time these pigments were made into paints to form green to paint Victorian locomotives. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

 

Well, in some circumstances it seems to be a problem as artists have reported online that if you mix a light-fast colour with a "fugitive" pigment, the latter component fades over time cause a shift in the colour mix! How railway paint might have been affected by combining stable and unstable pigmented colours is a, frankly, scary thought!  If the Chrome Yellow tended to darken rather than fade, but the blue pigment had colour-permanence, overall one ought to expect a darkening of the green. It is tempting to wonder if the desaturation of the Tenant green on 1463 is the result!

 

Miss T is a more than competent oil painter (Just won the Year 11 Art Prize!), so she will undertake the experiments. She raised her eyebrows at mixing exactly equal parts blue and yellow as, she cautioned, this sometimes leads to rather sludgy greens! 

 

We shall see.

 

Also on hand is some Titanium white to take it down for scale if necessary.

[Schooner]

1 hour ago, Caley Jim said:

proof is a flake of the original paint!

...or is it?!

[New Haven Neil]

10 hours ago, Schooner said:

...or is it?!

 

Only if it was from inside a toolbox lid or somewhere that the light hadn't got to.  Oh and the varnish hadn't yellowed.  And maybe the pigments not reacted. But otherwise....😉

[Schooner]

Yes, I'd been wondering about the impact of varnish/lacquer/wipe mit oily cloth...but suspect we've got enough variables for the time being!

[ChrisN]

I think as ever you will have to go with, 'the balance pf probabilities' and not 'beyond reasonable doubt'.

 

I would like to point out, unless you live in Homer's Springfield, radioactive vomit is the same colour as ordinary vomit.  No, don't ask.

[ChrisN]

On a more serious note.  It would appear that the green is darker rather than lighter.  Also, who made the model?  Depending on who it was makes it more or less reliable.  There is a model of a Cambrian loco made by apprentices at Oswestry and it is painted in a black/green, or rather Invisible green.  I would think that they would know what the colour should be and possibly used works paints.  

[Pint of Adnams]

Have you considered adding Nigel JL Digby's 'take' into the 'mix'? The Liveries of the Pre-Grouping Railways Volume Two East of England and Scotland - an expansion of an extended series first published in the BRM... he also has a predilection for referencing Carter, but his rendition of colour 7 is rather lighter. I have a copy of Carter's book (the 1963 2nd edition), the colour chips are surrounded by discolouration, there's some bubbling/blistering of the paint, and the samples are very small.

[Jeremy Cumberland]

The company I work for is very heavily involved with colour, and I've been following this thread with interest, although I claim no specialist knowledge beyond chemical safety. One thing I would say is that you (or your daughter) should be careful handling medium chrome yellow. if you get the genuine pigment, that is, not just something with the same name. It contains lead and is toxic. If you are using it in powder form, wear a proper face mask (FFP2/N95 or better, not one of those blue Covid things).

 

Quite honestly, I would think that trying to get the correct colour by mixing equal quantities of Prussian blue and medium chrome yellow oil paints was a fool's errand. If the recipe for NER Saxony Green was indeed equal quantities of Prussian blue and medium chrome yellow, this would have been of the powdered pigments. If you buy them as oil paints, you have no idea how much pigment each paint actually contains. Quite likely the quantities are very different, and if you are using synthetic "medium chrome yellow" then this will probably be made up of a number of other pigments (a yellow, an orange and a white, perhaps), and trying to relate this back to a quantity of medium chrome yellow pigment will be next to impossible.

 

In any case, oil paints for artists are very different from coating paints. Artists oil paints tend to be very opaque, and if you want to layer them, you need to thin them down considerably. Coating paints contain far less pigment and are intended to be built up in layers. I expect that the undercoat, varnish and preparation between coats had a considerable effect on the final colour of Saxony Green - it certainly does with "lake" paints.

 

I took a look at other uses of the name and what colours it is associated with. "Saxony green" isn't widely used, but "Saxon green" was a popular colour of cloth in the eighteenth century, originating from Saxony. From what I can tell, it appears to have been a bright mid-green, in contrast with the duller greens previously available. It was made from Saxon blue (a tincture of indigo) with the addition of yellow.

 

Most modern paints named "Saxon Green" are a dull, pale yellowish green - a rather flatter version of No. 18 in your book. I cannot imagine this being the same colour as "Saxon green" cloth. However, one very interesting find is T&R Williamson's Saxon Green floor paint, in their "Mastercraft Rail Floor Paints" range:

I have no idea of the provenance of this particular paint, but T&R Williamson's Spec 81 Crimson Lake can be traced back to Joseph Mason of Derby and the Midland Railway Company.

Edited July 4, 2023 by Jeremy Cumberland
Wrong colour number quoted

[Edwardian]

2 hours ago, ChrisN said:

On a more serious note.  It would appear that the green is darker rather than lighter.  Also, who made the model?  Depending on who it was makes it more or less reliable.  There is a model of a Cambrian loco made by apprentices at Oswestry and it is painted in a black/green, or rather Invisible green.  I would think that they would know what the colour should be and possibly used works paints.  

 

The York model was new to me, and there seems to be no other information available other than 'c.1890' and I have not seen it in the flesh. It is odd because it appears to show Tenant lining style (incurves), i.e. its original livery, but with black frames, which suggests W. Worsdell livery. If it was, say, made by apprentices at a NER engine works and used actual Saxony green, that would be one thing, but otherwise it is also just someone with 20 minutes' colour memory of the real thing's best match.  Thus, worthy of consideration, but hardly definitive.

 

That brings us to this, my poor photograph of a plate in the Record:

 

 

It is reproduced in the Record in the context of evidencing the livery, so is clearly felt by the author as to some degree authoritative.   

 

It is said to be a contemporary model (possibly 1882) of a Fletcher engine made by R Cairns of Darlington. This I have seen in the flesh, as it is in the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle, where it is, or was last time I went, in a glass cabinet in the main staircase hall. It is not well lit, as I recall, and the glass makes a decent picture of it impossible. 

 

This, then, should be late Fletcher (1878-1882) livery, a return to the pre-1870 bright 'Saxony', or grass green colour with Brunswick green borders (Record p.72), though the red lining might suggest a variation or an earlier Fletcher scheme. Things become murky for me here, but it should show Saxony green, and shows it as a 'grass green'.

 

Carter cites a pre-1896 reference (evidently describing T.W. Worsdell's claret-bordered livery, as "a light yellow green" and an 1896 reference to "light grass-green", 1900 as "light green", 1906 "a light yellow-green", and, 1914, "bright green".

 

All of which could, I suggest, be applied to the shade carried by the model, but clearly also covers a range of possibilities. 

 

Pint of Adnams reminds me that I have neglected the Nigel Digby volume. He describes it as a "light chrome green", refers, as you say, to Carter's number 7  (which his patch does not resemble, as you say). He also uses the descriptive terms "light green" and "grass green" and gives:

 

Pantone 364

BS 381 218

 

It is not clear, however, how he has arrived at the Pantone and BS numbers. 

 

 

His green does, however, look good to the eye and the value of his loco portraits is in showing the same colour in both light and shade. 

 

 

37 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

The company I work for is very heavily involved with colour, and I've been following this thread with interest, although I claim no specialist knowledge beyond chemical safety. One thing I would say is that you (or your daughter) should be careful handling medium chrome yellow. if you get the genuine pigment, that is, not just something with the same name. It contains lead and is toxic. If you are using it in powder form, wear a proper face mask (FFP2/N95 or better, not one of those blue Covid things).

 

No, I don't even think the original pigment is available; it's a reproduced colour, which, of course, suits artists better because they also avoid the instability of actual chrome yellow pigment. 

 

37 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Quite honestly, I would think that trying to get the correct colour by mixing equal quantities of Prussian blue and medium chrome yellow oil paints was a fool's errand. If the recipe for NER Saxony Green was indeed equal quantities of Prussian blue and medium chrome yellow, this would have been of the powdered pigments. If you buy them as oil paints, you have no idea how much pigment each paint actually contains. Quite likely the quantities are very different, and in any case if you are using synthetic "medium chrome yellow" then this will probably be made up of a number of other pigments (a yellow, an orange and a white, perhaps), and trying to relate this back to a quantity of medium chrome yellow pigment will be next to impossible.

 

Yep. Though this tends more to the point that, simply telling a modeller that some contemporary observer once recorded the recipe as equal parts of these two pigments doesn't necessarily help determine the colour of the loco thus painted!

 

I would add the variation possible in the pigments used at the time.

 

So, yes, not using pigments, not using the same type of paint, not using paint in one case at least made with the historic pigment and then mixing!  I would agree, I don't think it likely to produce the answer to how NER Saxony green looked, but I do want to see what it does produce!  This is what makes the experiment fun. What do you get if you mix two paints of the stated colour? Does it come close to the range of 'grass green' shades you expect?

 

As I mentioned, my daughter entertains doubts on the matter, but, then, she gets to keep the paints for her art. 

 

37 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

 

In any case, oil paints for artists are very different from coating paints. Artists oil paints tend to be very opaque, and if you want to layer them, you need to thin them down considerably. Coating paints contain far less pigment and are intended to be built up in layers. I expect that the undercoat, varnish and preparation between coats had a considerable effect on the final colour of Saxony Green - it certainly does with "lake" paints.

 

I took a look at other uses of the name and what colours it is associated with. "Saxony green" isn't widely used, but "Saxon green" was a popular colour of cloth in the eighteenth century, originating from Saxony. From what I can tell, it appears to have been a bright mid-green, in contrast with the duller greens previously available. It was made from Saxon blue (a tincture of indigo) with the addition of yellow.

 

Most modern paints named "Saxon Green" are a dull, pale yellow - a rather flatter version of No. 19 in your book. I cannot imagine this being the same colour as "Saxon green" cloth. However, one very interesting find is T&R Williamson's Saxon Green floor paint, in their "Mastercraft Rail Floor Paints" range:

I have no idea of the provenance of this particular paint, but T&R Williamson's Spec 81 Crimson Lake can be traced back to Joseph Mason of Derby and the Midland Railway Company.

 

Interesting. I'd say that could be within the range. 

 

Anyway, thanks for following and chipping in.

 

EDIT: A quick fix?

 

Aside from the fact that I think thinner coasts with the control of an airbrush is likely a better way to go than rattle can, I always fear that the right colour in all its depth might look too dark on a 4mm model. With airbrushing I can add some white to take it down a tad, but obviously couldn't with an aerosol can.

 

 

 

Edited July 4, 2023 by Edwardian

[asmay2002]

As a bit of a wildcard idea the German state of Saxony had used a green and white flag since 1815.  Is the NER colour meant to resemble the colour of the flag? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Saxony

 

[Edwardian]

41 minutes ago, asmay2002 said:

As a bit of a wildcard idea the German state of Saxony had used a green and white flag since 1815.  Is the NER colour meant to resemble the colour of the flag? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Saxony

 

 

Well now, that's interesting. Thank you.

 

I am familiar somewhat with Saxony. An electorate of the Holy Roman Empire, like, say, Bavaria, it became a kingdom after joining Napoleon's Confederation of the Rhine. Like Bavaria it eventually changed sides, but did so too late and much of it was swallowed up by Prussia, Saxon troops having been reluctant members of Blucher's army in the 100 Days campaign.

 

Now the flag of the Electorate and the Napoleonic Kingdom was black and yellow, so I was entirely unfamiliar with the rump Kingdom's post Napoleonic green and white flag.

 

This is depicted in varying shades, but they do all conform to a range that might be called 'grass green', so it's tempting indeed to think that this is what Victorians had in mind when they named the colour. 

 

Here is a Wiki graphic:

 

A cigarette card:

 

 

Here is a Twentieth Century 'cheering flag'

 

 

Someone has codified the modern flag colour: