Halvarras

Thanks Mike, it was all so long ago now......... !

I have a b&w photo up on the screen in front of me showing D5026 in 1970, front 3/4 from No1 end, facing left. Sourcing and copyright could be issues, so here's a description!

As a shortcut for the livery, if you can locate a photo of D7660 in Bsy, that is how it looks.

Basically the SLW illustrations have it correct - it has a data panel to the left of the works plate. The presence of the latter pushes the BR arrow logo up tight against the cabside window. The running numbers (Rail Alphabet style and still with D prefix - looks like they have a small "M" or "W" below........which was D05?....I can't remember!) are aligned with this, so the bodyside number is high up between the two lower grilles nearest the main radiator grille, with the number at the far end positioned in the usual place below the second man's window. The yellow panel is rectangular (no rounded upper corners) and quite large, extending from about 2" below the handrails to about 1" above the bottom edge of the connecting doors. OHLE flashes - one per end on the right-hand c/door in line with the marker lights, one per side between the two uppermost steps. These steps are panelled over but the boiler compartment grilles and filler ports are not. Most of the valance panels are there but those below the 2nd & 4th lower bodyside grilles (on this side anyway) are missing. Underframe tanks appear to be unmodified. 

Phew - I wish I could just have forwarded the photo!

Since D7660 and D5389 had red bufferbeams I'd assume SLW are right about that too. I find it amusing that Derby HQ flagged up Swindon's error in painting D1030's bufferbeams red when the works next door were doing the same thing!!

It's quite astonishing that so few photos exist of D5026's livery variation when it displayed it for 4 years. However it does appear in Strathwood's 'Sixties Diesel and Electric Days Remembered III' - take a very close look at page 109!

Embellishments to the standard dark green livery went through three distinct phases, and white or off-white stripes seemed to go out of fashion just as the 1960s dawned, which perhaps is why EE's Class 37s didn't receive the Class 40's upper stripe. In 1961 the Hymeks and Deltics appeared with yellow-green skirting, but as noted above this area was in the firing line for dirt accumulation hence a preference for moving the contrasting band up the bodyside of the Brush Type 4 in 1962. If one can imagine the 'in yer face' effect of the latter being finished with a yellow-green band it was no surprise that a subtler shade was chosen! Sherwood green was clearly in favour after that as in 1965 it was used for the refurbished Baby Deltics' and DP2's skirting in preference to the brighter colour.

It does appear on some photos that a few of Stratford's Class 47s in the D177x range had their lighter bands repainted in a shade with a distinctly blue hue, as clearly illustrated on page 136 of Strathwood's first 'Sixties Diesel and Electric Days Remembered' volume. This colour also seemed to be used by some depots, notably Cardiff Canton, to delete D prefixes from its Class 47s in the late '60s, not by overpainting just the D but the entire light green area of the cabside around the number. I ranked this as looking nearly as horrible as the obliteration of Ds on some LMR Peaks using something akin to black tar! Both would have looked better left untouched.

The off-white stripe made a comeback in 1965 of course, on the NBL Class 29 conversions, but unusually in conjunction with Sherwood green - maybe in somebody's mind at the time this was making up for the plain appearance of the 'donor' Class 21s, the only Type 2 not to have any such decorative relief! 

True, on the face of it this may seem strange when there were so many green locomotives wearing full yellow ends (again though, not from Swindon which only turned out D808/10, D6312/31 like this - but it had a really big liking for Bsy!!) However DMUs tended to be repainted from early on and often, and green units were all but extinct by 1971 when Crewe was still releasing overhauled locos in touched-up Gfy livery (it stopped this practice and went blue for all repaints later that year - I recall seeing 1842 that Autumn and thinking 'wow look at that, a 18xx in blue - at last!!')

On 19/03/2017 at 10:21, robertcwp said:

I think the BSYP style was only used by a few works, Swindon and Derby spring to mind as the main ones, which would have limited the classes that carried that livery, which was very short-lived as full yellow ends became standard from late 1966 or early 1967, not that that prevented Crewe turning out new D1111 in GSYP around that time.

Looking at introduction dates, if Crewe' s build had switched to blue at the same time as Loughborough, D1105-11 would have looked like D1953-61. 

On 20/05/2019 at 17:31, stovepipe said:

Wonderful transition era view of Laira with 120, 121 and 116(?) in BSYP in view.

Plymouth Laira depot sometime in the late 1960's by Fred Castor, on Flickr

Wonderful view indeed! And having visited Laira on 11/9/68 I reckon I can identify some of the vehicles and have a guess at the rest. The Class 121 must be W55034, there that day and AFAIK the only Class 121 DMBS in Bsy livery. The three green centre trailers will be withdrawn Class 120 W59579/84/85 - no idea why these were removed from headcode-panel-fitted Class 120 sets so early but thanks to seeing these three that day I completed that sub-set. 

The Bsy headcode-fitted Class 120 far left could be either W51575/59581/51584, W51578/59580/51587 or W51580/59586/51589 (the latter was very common on the Truro - Falmouth branch, I was sick of the sight of the thing!) The power cars of W51573/59296/51582 were also Bsy but the centre car was green - bizarrely it had replaced one of these withdrawn ones! The Class 116 is much trickier but W50848/59356/50901 was in Bsy that June.....

As for all those locos visible on the Dump - on the date of my visit this contained D6300/2/3/4/5/11/13/17/49 & D801, at that time the first D8xx Warship to be laid up. D800/2 were in their last few weeks' service and that afternoon D802 passed by piloting D1007 on an up milk (3A64).

By that date the last DMUs still working in green livery in the vicinity were Class 120 W51576/59582/51590, which I seemed to record every time I went anywhere near a railway line, and Class 121 W55029. I'm not aware of any WR DMUs in Gfy livery.

In the early years of BR blue Class 08s with ladders weren't that unusual. Those which stood a good chance of finding themselves 'under the wires' lost them early, e.g. Hamilton's D3284 in March 1968 (see Strathwood's 'Looking Back at Shunters II'), but progress was slower on Regions without overhead wires and so slow at the extremities that St Blazey's green 08840 and Penzance's blue 08928 achieved TOPS renumbering still fitted with them. BZ's blue 08931 is probably another as it still had them in August 1973 and was renumbered 'locally'. Curiously the ladders were removed from BZ's other green TOPS 08 - 08839. A couple of photos of 08928 with ladders can be found on the Cornwall Railway Society website under Penzance/Long Rock.

I can shed light on the first blue/grey Class 101 units and it's earlier than most people think. Around May/June 1974 five 3-car sets were reallocated all the way from Hamilton to Laira, where they received WR set numbers P800-4. P800/1 initially went to work on Devon and Cornish branch lines still in plain blue livery but P802-4 arrived in the area freshly repainted in blue/grey. Note that this was the same year that the first DMU refurbishment 'white with blue stripe' set was sent on its rounds (coincidentally this was from the same batch of Class 101 units), which means that these blue/grey Met-Cams were not refurbished, and retained their two-character headcode panels. The most likely explanation is that on their way to Laira they passed through Swindon Works where their low-density seating saw them classified as cross country units so they were repainted to match the local Classes 119s & 120s. They didn't stay in the far South West for long and were reallocated to Bristol the following year. When refurbishment eventually caught up with them they went white/blue stripe, which seemed a backward step!

If photos of Hymeks on the Waterloo-Exeters are rare, it may be worth mentioning that John Vaughan's b&w album 'Diesels on the Southern' (1980) has a slightly fuzzy photo of none other than D7000 waiting to depart Waterloo on 1V15 the 15.10 to Exeter St David's, on 21 January 1970. This was during its green full yellow period (and looking very run down by then), it went blue a few months later.

On 18/04/2020 at 21:53, Russell Saxton said:

In one of the Classic Diesel and Electric mags there is a shot of D7030 without a yellow panel in 1964.
I'm sure i read something about this but for the life of me I can't recall what it said.
Anyone know more?
 

Hi Russ,

I remember this, it actually started with a b&w shot of D1033 Western Trooper in maroon apparently without a yellow panel at Plymouth North Road on 17 April 1964 on the front cover and inside the quarterly Western Power magazine, Issue 1 (September 2007). There were a few unconvincing theories and it remained a mystery until a year later when Issue 5 (September 2008) turned up with that b&w photo of D7030. It was me who flagged up that this was suffering the same issue as D1033, that its light green band also appeared to have faded and that both photos were taken at Plymouth North Road probably on the same day (it's dated just April 1964) and most likely by the same photographer; both images were from the same Stewart Blencowe collection anyway. Having noted photographic anomalies similar to Jonny777' s weird photo of 5524 above in the past I suspected something similar was going on with these, but didn't have the technical knowledge to explain it myself. Contributors to the next issue of WP suggested that it was either ageing negatives of a certain type or the use of a filter. Maybe it was a combination of the two. Any suggestion of image tampering by SB was rejected, a conclusive technical explanation was never reached but perhaps jonny777 has just supplied it.  Just to add to the confusion the same issue included a shot of D6305 & D6341 at Laira from the same source, both apparently devoid of the yellow panels they should have had!

By coincidence the above story occurred to me only yesterday when the subject of absent wasp stripes on Class 08s cropped up in another thread, although I don't think this applies there - I would imagine the black/yellow/basic livery contrasts would be too great (??)

Neil

On 23/04/2018 at 07:51, Enterprisingwestern said:

I have a photo, I think it's posted on one of Russell Saxtons livery threads, of, I think from memory, D3586 at Crewe in 1970/71 sans stripes.

 

Mike.

I've seen this photo, I don't have it to hand but from (my) memory it was D3583 at Chester late December 1969, the year at least confirmed by the Class 24 in the shot having a data panel. 

Shunters in far-flung corners of the network could avoid modifications for some time - Class 03 D2127 in Cornwall was still stripeless in June 1966, had gained them by April 1967 but those on the radiator end did not wrap around onto the sides of the casing. I wonder where they were applied....? In 1974 St Blazey's green 08840 and Penzance's early blue (cabside BR logos) 08928 still had radiator ladders, and I suspect BZ's early blue (battery box logos) 08931 did too.

Between Plymouth and Saltash, most likely milk tanks. Certainly happened in DMU days.

15 hours ago, bike2steam said:

It was only a few minutes walk from Willesden Junction station, to the 'hole in the wall' at Old Oak.

Oh yes, I did Willesden and then down the road to Old Oak via 'that hole' a number of times 1973-75. Happy days!

The old Bradford Barton albums "More Great Western Steam in Cornwall" and "Cornwall's Railways - A Pictorial Survey" contain photos of 70019 Lightning (especially) and 70024 Vulcan working the down Cornish Riviera through to Penzance in 1951/2. So far though I have only ever seen one photo of a 75xxx in Cornwall, 75025 exiting Truro's Highertown Tunnel with a down parcels in 1954, which appeared in an issue of the erstwhile Railway Reflections magazine. But for this picture I wouldn't have believed these ever crossed the Tamar. In case this is of interest.

Far too late now to take up the small matter of Britannias not being Great Western with the publishers I suppose, but 70019 on the Long Rock turntable is a sight to behold!

Hello John,

I certainly do! And it has indeed been a long time. That supplement ("Un-Corporate Image") was issued with TRACTION 90 and BRM both April 2002 - the former is in my loft and the latter's supplement, now rather dog-eared, has been close at hand for the past 18 years although currently temporarily mislaid due to a house move in late January (blimey that was close......!) My 30 minutes daily exercise allowance will just about get me to St Blazey depot to see.....er.....not a lot these days  Although yesterday I went in search of first-built CDA 375000, having photographed it there brand new on 14/9/87, and it was the third one I looked at!!! Should have played the lottery.....

I have seen The Stationmaster's interesting revelations in a separate thread on your question. In the intervening period nothing has come to light which adds to my comments above. Many years ago at a Bristol show I purchased a photo from Exe-Rail showing a spotless D838 in Mfy with data panels inside Swindon Works alongside D7000 in Gsy, unfortunately undated but most likely first week of September 1968. D7000 emerged in Gfy on 22/9/68 and a b&w photo of it passing through Swindon station that day appears to show it still without data panels; on the same day ex-works D1063 was photographed 'inside' with them so application in the early days was probably dependant on a full works repaint (which would also be true of TOPS renumbering five years later).

Please let Russ know he's correct, it was definitely 1968!

Regards,

Neil

On 26/02/2020 at 19:56, Argos said:

 

With the odd appearance of a class 29 and very occasional class 20.

The was also a single DMU working operated by a Class 120 upto 1970.

 

https://www.railcar.co.uk/type/class-120/operations-scotland

 

There's also a nice photo of a Class 120 at Oban on 4/8/70 in the colour album "Heyday of the Scottish Diesels" by David Cross (page 42). Unusually at such a date the nearest vehicle (DMBC with token exchange recess) is still in green livery with small yellow panel, but I suspect the rest of the unit is blue - can't be absolutely certain because the sun is on the wrong side. The green vehicle displays set number 115, perhaps somebody out there can identify it.....?

I recall a futile attempt at unscrewing one from withdrawn 6319 on the Laira dump in Sep 71 with a piece of metal, got spotted by a member of staff and had to scarper pronto! TBH I always thought they were made from a Formica-type material and screwed on with self-tappers in all four corners - necessary to survive the hostile environment of a locomotive' s front-end where even paint could struggle to hold on (a special mention here for D828 not-so-Magnificent in maroon livery!)

I reckon this has to be 1962. The Western appears to be D1004 Western Crusader in green livery with a mid-grey roof and small yellow warning panels, as built, which was new to traffic 12/5/62 - it didn't take many hours' running for sooty deposits to build up around the exhaust ports. The NBL Type 2s have OHLE flashes which began to appear in 1961, being applied to these locos considerably faster than yellow panels (despite them rarely venturing anywhere near OHLE!) - at least D6333 & D6334 went from plain green straight into blue with full yellow ends in 1967.

I remember painting these yellow panels on my Triang-Hornby BR brake van circa 1971 and adding "TO WORK WITH AIR-BRAKED TRAINS ONLY" (much like the Bachmann model currently available from Kernow) using a sharpened matchstick. These days I'd struggle to see the matchstick  !!

The yellow was Humbrol no 8, sadly missed as nothing available these days has that kind of density.......

On 22/02/2020 at 21:17, w124bob said:

 

Of note is 6111 with discs still running in 1967/8 the caption doesn't confirm for sure the date but it's stabled with a blue cl29. 

And that blue Class 29 has a data panel, which suggests the photo was taken at some point after D6111's withdrawal. The latter's dirty windscreens would support this.

Talking of data panels, I note that Dapol's Gfy 6112 correctly has these, but Bfy 6107 doesn't - surely they'd have been applied by the time its D prefixes had been painted over......?

On one of my, er, very frequent visits to Truro station in the late '60s I recall seeing somebody on a stretcher being 'loaded' through one of these windows. They were wheeled into position on a trolley with pneumatic tyres which nobody ever seemed to get around to pumping up by a porter we called Lurch (you'd know why if you saw him  !)

Having become interested in railways in 1966 and living in Cornwall, it's any and all hydraulics for me, but particularly the Western Class 52s.

And especially those full-bore standing starts at the 1 in 60 up to Highertown Tunnel out of Truro's platform 2.

Here's a driver enjoying his job! Imagine those twin Maybachs roaring..............Western Glory, yes indeed!!

They certainly explain the otherwise odd positioning of those cab side OHLE flashes - a clue I missed! Your suggested reason for D4 remaining unique sounds logical.

D6' s full yellow ends appeared to have been only just applied, the white stripes had been painted out but not the D prefixes - perhaps the painter had dived off for a quick cup of tea!

I first noticed those slipping standards on Deltic 9000 at Kings Cross in late '72, the numbers were too high. Many Class 40s became similarly defective around that time! 

I admit to never noticing D4' s extra footsteps below the nose grilles and nose top handrails before - was the intention to make reaching the windscreens easier for cleaning? Any other Peaks so modified?

This despite getting my own (b&w Instamatic) photo of D4 at Toton on 26/7/70, also D6 with newly applied FYEs on green. On that day - this then Cornish spotter's one and only visit to the depot - D1-4/6-11 were present, D5 was away at Derby Works about to become the second BR blue Class 44 but I'd already bagged that one 8 months earlier so happy days! I also scored D12 later that day. My Class 44 wrap-up very nearly didn't happen - getting from Blackwater on the Reading-Redhill line to Toton and back by train and bus on a Sunday was an absolute nightmare!

Great photos by the way - modellers should note the neat alignment of BR arrows and running numbers, this commenced with XP64 D1733 and held firm on locos with cabside logos and bodyside numbers (positions reversed on some Class 47s) until around 1972 when standards began to slip.....

True, but no more than half a dozen. The WR' s first two eth conversions were early blue 1932 and green 1936, in late 1971. Since the WR had no eth stock at the time I believe they were loaned to Gateshead for the summer of 1972 and worked the ECML. They became 47493 and 47494 still in early blue and green respectively. A few of the 11xx series were eth fitted whilst still in green, I can't recall which ones offhand but under TOPS they were renumbered within the 4752x range.