Merchant Navy Class - SR Black (Wartime) livery

[RateTheFreight]

Hi all,

 

Does anyone have any mock ups of what the Southern Railway wartime/black livery looked like on the first batch of Merchant Navy's?

 

I'm guessing there are no colour photographs of any of the original batch in this livery? I've always thought that despite it being a rather bland/basic livery, it can look attractive on larger locos, as evidenced by Flying Scotsman's stint in it (appreciate it may not have been 100% authentic)

 

On a side question, does anyone know how long after the war the loco's kept this livery? I'm awaiting delivery of the 'book of the Merchant Navy's' which I gather will reveal all but wanted to put it out there.

If anyone has a general link to something that shows Merchant Navy liveries over time that would be grand too and would be of great help.

 

Thanks as always.

 

Greg

[Graham_Muz]

I have an original Merchant Navy on my work bench at the moment, that I really must pull my finger out and finish, that will be out shopped in Wartime Black as 21C7.

 

21C1 to 21C6 were originally in Malachite before succumbing to black between May 192 and December 1943

21C7 to 20 were introduced in black between June 1942 and June 1945 (21C20 was the shortest in black as she gained Malachite 2 months after introduction in August 1945)

The first of the 20 gain malachite post war was 21C12 in April 1945 and the last was 21C8 in August 1947 

[RateTheFreight]

Thank's for the info Graham, look forward to seeing your model once completed (great website by the way, it's firmly bookmarked now).

 

My 'book of the Merchant Navy's' appeared yesterday which in addition to being a very informative book has some really decent (albeit black and white) photo's of the various MN's.

It also included a decent photo of 'Orient Line' in the black livery which as suspected gives the MN's a different and interesting profile. One of the other interesting points from the book seems to be that the 'express blue' livery the MN's and others carried didn't weather well which is not something i'd heard before. It made me wonder whether it was the colour itself to blame or the composition of the paint which differed from the other liveries carried.

 

Greg

[Graham_Muz]

Hi Greg

 

Thanks for you kind comment about my blog, as you have an interest in the Merchant Navy's in there original form these two blog posts might be interest to you if you have not found them already:

 

http://grahammuz.com/2011/09/14/talking-stock-1-bulleid-merchant-navy-pacific%E2%80%99s/

 

http://grahammuz.com/2013/05/09/talking-stock-24-3rd-series-merchant-navy-initial-livery-variations/

 

As far as I recall with reference to the wearing of the Blue livery it was more down to the colour stability of the blue paint itself (as blue was at the time a difficult to colour to produce)