I’ve googled a fair bit on this one, but can’t quite run this one to ground…
The WP silver and orange scheme on the diesel locos is really classy [:p] - was that for the passenger services, and the dark green scheme with horizontal yellow and red stripes for the freight work?
Dave
Looking at my copy of “D-Day on the Western Pacific, a railroad’s decision to dieselize,”
it seems the silver and orange (BTW I also liked) was used on all diesels from sometime in the 1950s up to about 1970.
I think about 1970 new management was brought in and changed the colors. It’s been awhile since I’ve read the book. I’m sure others could be more specific.
Jeff
Thanks Jeff. The green with yellow and red looks quite “busy” but no doubt there are plenty who like it…I reckon simpicity in colour shemes is often a winner…
Dave
The green and yellow was the paint scheme the FT locos were delievered in. The FT’s were the only units painted that way. They were used for freight.
When WP bought F3’s for the California Zephyr the silver and orange scheme with wings on the nose was chosen. The silver sides were actually unpainted stainless steel.
The freight scheme was then changed to a slightly simplified silver and orange. Painted silver sides instead of stainless steel and the black stripes on the instead if the wings. F3’s and F7’s received this scheme. Latter some freight unit were repainted in orange with no silver when shopped.
Passenger locos were F3’s and eventually FP7’s , they were numbered in the 800 series.
Freight locos includes F3’s and F7’s they were numbered in the 900 series.
Passenger units sometimes appeared on freights and with the decline of passenger service were eventually renumbered into the freight series. Some freight units has steam boilers so they could be used on passenger train.
The WP beliived in being flexible.
Another variation on the silver and orange is the size and lettering style of the “WESTERN PACIFIC” on the side oy the locos. The smaller Zephyer style lettering being older.
Thanks Donald, interesting stuff.
So if one was modelling WP, with that flexibility of WP, one could put a silver and orange loco at the front of a freight ,and a green loco pulling passenger providing a bit of contrast on the layout…hmmmm
Dave
Dave,
The Port Hedland - Mount Newman line was built using two Western Pacific Orange and Silver F-7 units, 907 and 924, I think, but they had suffix letters I can’t remember. Eventually they were both repainted red and yellow, a scheme only used on these units and they are both preserved in those later colours. But the only two F-7s in Australia were WP Orange and Silver.
Peter
Peter - U.S. western area locos on our west coast. good stuff!
Where are they preserved? In Perth? or up in Port Headland?
Dave
I doubt the green FT’s ever pulled a passenger train. They were repainted silver and orange very shortly after the silver and orange was adopted.
Actually the FT’s were used system wide whether on the Exposition Flyer which was the forerunner of theCalifornia Zephyr or on any freight job. And they stayed in the original paint which was Woodfield Green,Diamond Yellow and Omaha Orange until 1947 when the color were changed.
The silver and orange was one of the changes that Al Perlman brought in during is tenure at WP.
Al Perlman is credited (blamed) for replacing the silver and orange with green. The silver and orange was adopted in 1947. Actually some WP locomotives were painted “MacLeod Green” in the 1970’s shortly before Perlman became president on December 1, 1970. "MacLeod Green is a lighter (more olive shade) than “Perlman Green”
The green on WP locomotives varied somewhat depending on paint manufacturer and batch.
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As a note, I have it on good authority that Woodfield Green was exactly the lighter green used on the Reading FPAs, by formula.
The various ‘Perlman-era’ greens were notorious both for being widely different by batch and for weathering to wildly different shades…