6233 in LMS red and wider livery debate of locomotives/stock

Oh good grief, save us from pointless pedants. The VOR is an entirely different case, being a tourist line, and was kept far cleaner than regular service stock as I am quite sure you are well aware.

 

Yes but you were quite adamant that steam locos wouldn't have received blue in the corporate blue era. I agree they would have been filthy, but I submit that they would have been blue under the filth, that is if they ever saw a paintbrush at all.

 

Actually my *suggestion* was intended to convey that there might not have been a corporate blue era at all if steam had stayed. It was part of the new clean modern railway image, another facet of which was the speedy demise of steam. We shouldn't forget, what with 'self cleaning' smokeboxes, that the last years of steam were marked by filth everywhere, not just on the steam engines.

 

If mainline steam had survived in Britain into (say) the mid-1970s as it did in other similar, capitalist western European countries like France or West Germany, it is likely that BR would have continued to paint locos plain unlined black. The surviving locos would have been (nearly) exclusively used on freight. Perhaps some of the surviving 8Fs would have received the double-arrow logo on the tender, yes, but that's all. There's a good reason why locos were painted black after all. Maybe they might have painted Cromwell (or equivalent) into BR blue if a Brit or two survived longer doing railtours?!??!

 

I think what bothers me about the whole debate is that there's a severe lack of respect for the painters and cleaners of the actual steam era who took pride in their charges.

When you consider the wide range of authentic liveries that steam locomotives can reasonably portray (okay very limited for 9Fs but for Jubilees there's at least six or seven variations) I have to ask why you wouldn't want it to represent as accurately as possible the actual livery it carried? I've read posts from people on this forum bemoaning that skill sets for overhauling locomotives is disappearing but the same people then immediately are dismissive about the paint job and how it should be finished.

When you consider how important the livery was for the corporate minded railways in the 20s and 30s, and the beautiful liveries that existed both grouping and pre-grouping, and how smart the later BR liveries could be when they were kept reasonably clean on well worked locomotives, surely the aim is to always try and capture that era as best as possible - not create something which never happened? I can only think there'd be a number of people unhappy at the way their old charges have been treated.

When Leander was in LMS red she was fantastic. It's a beautiful livery and it had been applied beautifully to a reasonably as built Jubilee that would have worn that livery. When Royal Scot had the same livery applied - having never worn it in that form - it looked awful, particularly last time around in the faded pink. Two different engines reportedly portraying the same livery. Only one was accurate.

We might decry the Royal Scot trust for choosing BR green this time around, but I don't think anyone can deny that it looks utterly sensational - and accurate too.

And I'd like to think - however much we might associate City of Truro as 3440 and in the indian red livery - that she was better looking as 3717 in the livery she is actually accurate for.

Yet I say all of that, and strangely I enjoyed the sight of the green 9F at the GCR but was totally disgusted by the "balcony coach" (which I still regard as an act of vandalism). I disliked the liveries applied to the Fairburns at Lakeside yet I enjoyed inauthentic LNER garter blue applied to Bittern.

I guess we need to look at it on a case by case basis in some respects!

One last point: the straw man argument for "you didn't donate, therefore you shouldn't have a say" is wearying. If a good point is being made, it doesn't matter who it comes from and what their position is.

 

Look on the bright side though, at least no one has (yet) painted an engine so farfetchdly as D9016 was with its Porterbrook Purple (I shall discount the early days of preservation!). Most fictitious liveries haven't been too far outside the ballpark - at least the fictitious liveries which have been worn by 35005, 48624, 46441, 45699, 92214 etc have precedent among other locos of their parent companies or even members of the same class, in some cases. I also like to see locos liveried accurately, but if someone has spent 350,000+ on overhauling an engine which would otherwise not be running, I'm happy to give them a little leeway with the paintbrush .

Something to say though, should the idea that a loco is a historical artefact and should be presented accurately, extend to newbuilds?

 

Gosh! Who would have thought that a discussion on liveries would produce so much froth?

 

I for one am thankful that some crimson lake red shall be returning to the main line in 2016. It has been a drought the last few years. I also like more of the vivid colors. 61306 Mayflower for me this year has been a complete delight for example. If I had a collection of locos like Mr. Hosking(sp) a pallet of paint schemes would be important because there is quite a bit of history from different eras of time especially about the trains that we discuss here on Nat pres everyday.

A colorful paragraph not to say the least.

 

So, would you turn out to see Galatea in full cry on the S&C??

 

Handsome, a fine looking machine................

 

I would and whilst the livery doesn't excite me too much, the sound of a Jubilee on full song would be well worth listening to - a microphone is most definitely colour blind.

 

OK, you got me there

 

I'm not sure if you're missing the point on purpose but it's not the cost of the paint that's the main factor but the several hundreds of thousands of pounds that need to be spent to get the loco working in the first place. Many locos have yet to steam since leaving Barry while others have had their moment in the limelight only to languish in a siding for lack of funds to do another overhaul. So are you telling me that if somebody approached a group whose loco is years away from steaming again, if ever, and said "I'll fund an overhaul but I'd like it to carry my company logo/corporate colour scheme(a la D9016)/name it after my mum," you'd prefer them not to take the money but let it continue to rust away?

 

Well, it's a possibility, but neither do I believe in Father Christmas, the Tooth Fairy, or that the Earth is flat! Most liveries are decided by the owner and bringing in hypothetical situations doesn't move things on very much. There have been many suggestions here excusing spurious schemes, but few actually stating a genuine case for them. In that regard, I can refer back to the late 1960s / early 1970s and the Lakeside Class 4 Tanks, the locos at Carnforth and the art gallery that was Howarth. BR had gone to much trouble to eliminate the old fashioned steam engine and wanted , in the interests of displaying a modern, go-ahead railway, to be rid of anything that connected them to itself. The jump in preservation of withdrawn locos did not fit in with this policy, and to remove any connection with the past declared that the BR insignia was copyright and must not be applied to preseved steam engines (likewise, a supplement became payable on all locos purchased from private scrap yards in an attempt to deter preservation attempts). Since BR livery could not be applied, some very imaginative schemes blossomed forth, but most died when the prohibition was lifted.

The cost of painting is indeed a small part of an overhaul cost, but that in no way explains why an authentic scheme cannot be used, it's no more expensive than a spurious one. Nor does "It's my engine and I can do what I like," sound a very mature attitude; ownership confers rights but also responsibilites, and I have already alluded to the responsibilities to an historic artifact, which a steam (and preserved diesel) engine certainly is. That an engine has spent its entire preserved life, now often longer than its working life, in an incorrect livery does not make that livery correct. It simply means it's been incorrect for a very long time.

Nor does the "It's only a coat of paint" point of view hold water; if it did, why are we up to Page 7 of this thread, with many more such threads appearing in the past? As an engineer, I have to admit that a 'surface coating' is no more than protection for the metal below, but realistically there is much more to it than that. Throughout the history of the locomotive owners have realised the potential to what we now call public relations of a smart appearance. George Stephenson had 'Rocket' painted yellow with white chimney to convey the impression of speed and cleanliness(!) at a time when objections due to smoke pollution were rife (some things don't change!). All early railway companies painted their stock in many hues with much brass and copper ornamentation for the same purposes; even throughout the 1930s one railway continued with the ornamentation, while the others stuck to various colours to which lining, which serves no practical purpose, was applied. Even BR up to the early 1960s followed this pattern. Paint is important: it's the first thing people see, and on the basis of First Impressions count the most, leaves a lasting impression.

David Jenkinson and Bob Essery once produced a pretty thick book entitled 'Locomotive Liveries of the LMS', devoted to the subject of only one of the Big Four companies over 25 years. Dissatisfied with it, they rewrote it as FIVE volumes, each about the same size as the parent. It sold well. If liveries are so inconsequential, I have to ask why this is so.

 

Returning to the substantive element of the thread for a moment, IF 6233 was to be painted in BR red in a manner that replicated exactly the livery as worn in service, albeit by other class members, would that be a bad thing?

 

No it wouldn't, but then, to be really authentic, it would have to be re-numbered and re-named 46251 City of Nottingham as this was the only one of the class to carry BR red with the full curved front footplate as per 6233 .........TAXI !

 

To me, yes, but I admit that I might struggle for support on that one!

 

I look at is this way, a loco changed livery when it changed ownership so for a loco to change livery once more when yet another post 1968 owner takes charge, it's only following a years old convention. It just so happens that most owners stick to a livery that the coco carried in the past, although in early preservation days there were several corporate and other "one off" liveries. I can't see any difference between a colliery buying a surplus BR Jinty and painting it orange and a private tourist railway buying a loco and painting it in a colour of their own and for johnb to say that a post 1968 "non authentic" livery is not part of a loco's history is nonsense IMO.

 

"I like it like that" is a definitively genuine case in my book.

If my recall is correct I think you're exaggerating, to say the least the desire to keep locos in BR livery. Smart money is almost all owners had been interested in Railways pre BR, and probably many pre grouping. Most of what BR had done was hated, certainly amongst the western enthusiasts.

[Later] Just dug out a little booklet that has gone from bookshelf to bookshelf since about 1969 on the very early days of preserved railways. Pre grouping and private liveries seem to dominate except perhaps on the SVR where much stock seems in BR livery (still?). GWR locomotives are I think all approximating pre 1934 livery.

 

In my view, no. Would be nice to see.