The British Rail's corporate liveries is an identifiable colour design on engines and coaches, which have changed at certain points in the history of British Rail. Although the organisation was associated with Rail Blue from the mid-1960s to the 1980s, a number of other schemes were also used, especially when it was split into operating units (or sectors) in the mid-1980s, and then from 1994 began to be privatised with distinct franchise brands, colours, and designs operating in certain regions.
Pre-corporate liveries
At the formation of British Railways on 1 January 1948, early diesel, electric and gas turbine locomotives were already painted black with aluminium trim. By the late 1950s, this had been superseded by the same shade of green that was used on express passenger steam locomotives, although some locomotives were painted in a two-tone Brunswick and Sherwood green livery; Southern Region electric locomotives were painted a light shade of malachite green. Multiple units were also generally green, although this tended to be a lighter and bluer shade compared to the colour used on steam and diesel locomotives.
Corridor coaching stock was originally trialled in London & North Western Railway coach plum and off-white (nicknamed Plum and Spilt Milk) before Crimson (carmine red) and Cream livery (nicknamed Blood and Custard) was adopted across the network; non-corridor stock was painted plain Crimson.
In 1956, an all-over darker maroon, which more closely resembled the pre-nationalisation London, Midland & Scottish Railway livery, was reintroduced, except for the Southern Region, where locomotive-hauled stock was generally painted Coaching Stock Green (from July 1956 onwards) and a small number of express carriages on the Western Region which were in traditional GWR-style Chocolate and Cream.
With the reorganisation of British Railways in the mid-1960s, a complete break with the past was signalled by the introduction of a blue and grey livery which dominated all passenger rolling stock until the mid-1980s, when a new InterCity livery (dark grey and beige with a red and white waistband) was introduced along with a number of regional colour schemes.
Early liveries
The standard livery for most British Railways steam locomotives was black, often with a thin red, cream and grey trim; express passenger locomotives were not painted in the former middle chrome green colour of the Great Western Railway as is often stated, but were painted in British Standards: BS224 Deep Bronze Green also known as Land Rover Deep Bronze Green LRC001 with orange and black lining. This error in colour identification comes from an article and question published in a model railway magazine in the 1950s, where the responding editor made the error and it has frequently been repeated since then. This has been confirmed by records held at the National Railway Museum.
All Class 42 Warship diesels were delivered in green, but some Class 52s were delivered in maroon to match the then-standard coaching stock livery. This livery suited these diesel hydraulic classes and allowed the Western Region to once again show a degree of independence; it was not applied to any other diesel or electric classes (other than the Warships).
The 25 kV electric locomotives were painted from new in a striking shade of bright blue, known as Electric Blue. They retained this livery for some years, before being painted in Rail Blue when that became the standard.
In 1964, as part of a plan to develop a new corporate image for British Railways, a number of experiments were tried:
- Two Class 31 diesel locomotives were painted in trial liveries. No. D5578 was painted in an unlined Light Electric Blue,[1]
Rail Blue
Eventually, it was decided to standardise on a colour which became known as Rail Blue. Introduced in 1965 and also known as Monastral Blue, the colour was defined by British Rail standards BR28/6001 (Airless spray finish) and BR28/5321 (Brush finish).[5] It was a dark, greyish blue tone which hid the effects of dirt well. In the early years, the colour faded quite badly, becoming lighter and paler with time although this problem had been overcome by the late 1970s. European paint code RAL5020 (Ocean Blue) is a good match to Rail Blue. There is also a British Standard paint colour BS381C 114 called Rail Blue, which was introduced in 1964. The new British Rail double arrow symbol on locomotives (or leading vehicle, as was the case on multiple unit stock) and the vehicle number and other ancillary markings written in the Rail Alphabet typeface were other integral parts of the livery. This style of livery was also used by CSX Transportation.
Locomotives
This colour was applied to all diesel and electric locomotives, with the exception of the ends, which were painted yellow to improve visibility and the underframes and buffer beams which were painted black; the paints being to BSS 2660-0.003 and BSS 2660-9.103 respectively.[6]
Moving away from Rail Blue
The first break in the uniformity of Rail Blue came in 1976, with the introduction of the first InterCity 125 (HST). The distinctive angular shape of the HST power cars did not lend itself to applying yellow on the leading face, so the yellow was wrapped around and extended along the side of each power car; the coaches retained the usual blue/grey coaching stock livery.[12]
In 1978, the British Railways Board began planning a new livery for the future. In that August, Class 56 diesel locomotive no. 56036 was painted to test a modified livery[13][14] of all-over Rail Blue with the entire loco front in bright yellow to improve visibility; this extended down the sides of the locomotive to the rear of the cab windows which were, in turn, outlined in black. This livery was known as Large Logo livery as each side of the locomotive was dominated by a full body height BR double arrow symbol and had the loco number prominently displayed at twice the previous size.
This livery was well received by enthusiasts but, as the Class 56s only hauled freight, it was decided to extend the experiment to a passenger locomotive. Thus a Class 47 locomotive, no. 47170 County of Norfolk, which was allocated to Stratford and a regular performer on trains between
Sectorisation
InterCity
Following the introduction of the Advanced Passenger Train in 1983, a similar livery to the APT's (dark grey on the upper body and light beige on the lower, with two stripes of red and white separating them) was applied experimentally to two HST sets and the coaches operating the Gatwick Express service between London Victoria and Gatwick Airport.[4] This was referred to as the InterCity Executive livery, as the sets used were dedicated to operating morning/evening services operated for business travellers. Despite the InterCity brand having been introduced in 1966, the word Executive was dropped in 1985 and the livery was applied to all coaches and many locomotives used on InterCity services.
London and the South East
Launched as the London & South East sector's Express livery, this was a short-lived scheme which appeared on a limited number of units and routes before the advent of Network SouthEast's toothpaste red, white and blue striped livery. The livery comprised brown upper panels, with a colour described variously as biscuit or fawn along the lower panels and separated by a broad orange band. The livery derived its nickname from a perceived resemblance to the internal appearance of a