Green & Cream Standard Stock, Composite Subsurface Stock...

[spsmiler]

I am working through adding to my Flickr photostream some very old train photos (some will go back to the late 1970's).

So far I am on the flare-sided CO/CP & R stocks which includes 1st/3rd composite trailers, trailers with half-moon glass screens, high-back seats, low back seats and more. Geez, every train journey would have seen a different type of passenger car! (Even more so during the Q stock era, but alas I am too young to remember that).

I've noticed that I have some photos of 1960ts and Standard stock tube cars that have a green and cream internal colour scheme. How bizarre.

So far only some of the Subsurface images are online but hopefully everything will be online this weekend and I'll add some of the images here - not all of them, as there will be over 60 images and I think that would be too many!

btw, Some of these images were taken when I was a teenager and used a 110 film camera, the image quality is 'viewable' but nothing wonderful and those who remember film grain the size of the proverbial golf-ball will become reacquainted with something that you might have wished to have never seen again. Ah, to have had even a basic present-era digital camera!


Stamford Brook - with glass light bulb lampshades


I think this was taken at Stepney Green - even the envelope sleeve which contains the film negatives refers to this as 'unknown station'


CP-DM-53219-A-End-BusRed-CP-D-End-54195-TrainRed-Upminster
Below are my notes about this image which I published below it:

In later years the red CO and CP trains were painted in bus red instead of train red and had white car numbers instead of the gilt / gold car numbers.

Train red was darker than bus red and sometimes trains ran with units painted the both colours - as seen in this view which was taken at Upminster.

Unfortunately backlighting and grainy 400 ASA 110 format film do not show this as well as a modern digital camera would.

btw, Much detail comes courtesy of the 1979 edition of Brian Hardy's London Underground Rolling Stock.

[DWS]

The photo that said to be Stepney Green looks more like Mile End to me .

[gantshill]

Thank you for some lovely memories. I was always intrigued by the R and COP stock doors, as the glass just seemed to disappear into the roof of the train. I do miss the distinctive flares of those stocks.

[straphanger]

Feb 6, 2021 14:42:45 GMT spsmiler said:

I am working through adding to my Flickr photostream some very old train photos (some will go back to the late 1970's).

The late 70s isn't very old! It's recent!

[spsmiler]

Feb 6, 2021 19:05:27 GMT straphanger said:

Feb 6, 2021 14:42:45 GMT spsmiler said:

I am working through adding to my Flickr photostream some very old train photos (some will go back to the late 1970's).

The late 70s isn't very old! It's recent!

I agree - I was a teenager then, it seems like yesterday!

[spsmiler]

Feb 6, 2021 16:38:10 GMT DWS said:

The photo that said to be Stepney Green looks more like Mile End to me .

Yes, it might be. Both stations are of the same era and core design (Central line bit excepted) but I think Mile End has more substantial square shaped ceiling support pillars.

[Dstock7080]

Feb 6, 2021 22:20:22 GMT spsmiler said:

Feb 6, 2021 16:38:10 GMT DWS said:

The photo that said to be Stepney Green looks more like Mile End to me .

Yes, it might be. Both stations are of the same era and core design (Central line bit excepted) but I think Mile End has more substantial square shaped ceiling support pillars.

Have to agree with Mile End
Stepney Green still had tungsten bulb lighting into the early ‘80s and when fitted is that which survives today, the continuous fluorescent tube style.
Mile End had the broken, shaded style as an early adopter of fluorescent tubes.
On the eastbound platform can be seen the cream tiles with green band and black bottom, not found at Stepney Green.

[Chris W]

Feb 6, 2021 16:38:10 GMT DWS said:

The photo that said to be Stepney Green looks more like Mile End to me .

From a very early memory back in the very early 1980s (around the age of 10), the lights at Stepney Green had rounded frosted shades, which made the platforms even gloomier than Mile End.

[class411]

I well remember the green and cream interiors.

[Dstock7080]

Feb 7, 2021 11:19:56 GMT class411 said:

I well remember the green and cream interiors.

officially called by LT "cerulean blue" and "portland stone"

[spsmiler]

Feb 7, 2021 9:33:27 GMT Chris W said:

Feb 6, 2021 16:38:10 GMT DWS said:

The photo that said to be Stepney Green looks more like Mile End to me .

From a very early memory back in the very early 1980s (around the age of 10), the lights at Stepney Green had rounded frosted shades, which made the platforms even gloomier than Mile End.

Thanks everyone, so its Mile End. I will modify the image text.

Almost all my attempts to photograph inside trains that were lit with light bulbs (when underground) ended up as a disaster - the camera exposed for the light bulbs, leaving everything else underexposed. Therefore I made a point of avoiding trying to photograph at stations (below ground) which were lit with light bulbs.  

However, I had much success at open air stations (during the hours of daylight) when I noticed that florescent tubes were being installed. One of these designs (below) may have been what was used at Stepney Green. 





re: the green and cream photos, I've had to revert to my negatives to help me identify the individual tube cars. Numbers include 4905 and what I think is 4901. But I am yet to look at them all. These photos look ever-so-much sharper when viewed with a lightbox and lupe! I do not have dates for when they were taken, however there are visual clues from other images on the same films which show family events so hopefully I'll be able to get approximate time frames.

Also, I've been too ambitious in wanting to get everyone done in just two days - there are too many images! More photos will come midweek. 
   

[quex]

How lucky we are to have someone who photographed something as mundane as lampshades! It must have seemed a pointless thing to record at the time, but now they give such an amazing "flavour" of what LU was like back then in just a single object. We're indebted to you spsmiler for these wonderful photos.

My hope is that future generations will benefit likewise, with digital storage at such low cost and hassle making it easier than ever to record as much as possible.

[stapler]

Definitely Mile End. When the Central Line platforms out of shot) were opened post WW2, one of the LPTB's boasts was that fluorescent lighting had been installed throughout Mile End station. The same fitments were probably there when SPS took his pics in the 70s (Thank you SPS..they are very evocative)
Mile End got very tatty before its green and white refurb.
T was an elegance about both the trains and the stations back then, in design details like the lampshade, the direction boards and signwriting, the train red and gold lettering, all later swept away..

[Chris W]

Feb 7, 2021 23:16:55 GMT spsmiler said:

However, I had much success at open air stations (during the hours of daylight) when I noticed that florescent tubes were being installed. One of these designs (below) may have been what was used at Stepney Green. 

The hexagonal shade looks like the one I recall... 38 years on... !!

[jimbo]

The top shade is an Underground Group standard design, which were huge. I was once in the rear car of a westbound train at Mansion House when one of these fell to the platform from the overall roof, narrowly missing the train guard. But where is the lower station? I don't recognise the curved frame of that shade.

[DWS]

The station with the curved frame lamp shade is Whitechapel, that wall is alongside the westbound platform .

[jimbo]

Perhaps the Whitechapel and Bow Joint line had non-standard lighting, as it wasn't LT until 1950, after nationalization [Debunked below!]. I know some stations out to Upminster depended on gas lighting until transferred to LT in 1969.

[jimbo]

Feb 10, 2021 0:14:38 GMT jimbo said:

Perhaps the Whitechapel and Bow Joint line had non-standard lighting, as it wasn't LT until 1950, after nationalization. I know some stations out to Upminster depended on gas lighting until transferred to LT in 1969.

After fossicking through photos, I have debunked my prior hypothesis about station lighting on the Whitechapel and Bow Joint line. It seems clear that those stations were provided with standard Underground group lighting, even back before 1925. Whitechapel would have been similar but for severe bomb damage to the District line platforms during WWII. Subsequent repairs must have installed a widely available design, which was probably also used for the reconstructed Mile End platforms with the arrival of the Central line early post-WWII. New tunnel stations on the Central line eastern extensions were provided with fluorescent lighting.

Whitechapel: here , here and here. Wartime bomb damage here , here and here Perhaps Whitechapel District line was re-equipped with a rounder style of shade: here and here.
Stepney Green were hexagonal, even in 1925: here and here, and survived wartime bomb damage: here here and here.
Mile End pre-Central Line lights are probably hexagonal : here and here but maybe curved after reconstruction: here.
Bow Road lights were probably hexagonal here.
Bethnal Green opened with fluorescent lighting: here and here.

[spsmiler]

A little later than originally envisaged, I've added 16 photographs from circa 1979 / 1980 showing 1960ts trains on the Hainault - Wooodord shuttle.

Below are just a few of them...

my Flickr photostream is at this link: www.flickr.com/photos/citytransportinfo/with/50937684413/

These images are in the 'tube trains' album which has a photo of a 1962ts RAT as its cover image.

re: the inside car colours, most people would see these as being two different shades of green plus cream but as Dstock7080 pointed out earlier in this thread, officially LT called them "cerulean blue" and "portland stone". This begs the question 'which of the two shades of green seen inside these trains was actually blue?'



Inside car No. 4901 which was originally Standard Stock No. 7469, dates from 1927 and has a clerestory roof. Part of a ventilator can be seen in the clerestory at the top right of the image.


Looking towards the driver's cab door inside an unidentified 1960ts DM - driving motor.


Departing from platform 2 at Woodford station, the banner signal suggests that the train was heading for a siding where it would reverse its direction of travel.

Nearest to the camera is trailer car No. 4901 which was originally Standard Stock No. 7469 and dates from 1927. It is seen here after its ventilator scoops had been removed from the clerestory roof.

[quex]

Lovely images, thanks spsmiler. They really capture the "homely" feel of the Standard Stock cars.

I've always found it somewhat ironic that some of the first automated trains on the network operated with what was at the time some of the oldest rolling stock!

[spsmiler]

Feb 13, 2021 0:22:54 GMT jimbo said:

After fossicking through photos, I have debunked my prior hypothesis about station lighting on the Whitechapel and Bow Joint line. It seems clear that those stations were provided with standard Underground group lighting, even back before 1925. Whitechapel would have been similar but for severe bomb damage to the District line platforms during WWII. Subsequent repairs must have installed a widely available design, which was probably also used for the reconstructed Mile End platforms with the arrival of the Central line early post-WWII. New tunnel stations on the Central line eastern extensions were provided with fluorescent lighting.

Whitechapel: here , here and here. Wartime bomb damage here , here and here Perhaps Whitechapel District line was re-equipped with a rounder style of shade: here and here.
Stepney Green were hexagonal, even in 1925: here and here, and survived wartime bomb damage: here here and here.
Mile End pre-Central Line lights are probably hexagonal : here and here but maybe curved after reconstruction: here.
Bow Road lights were probably hexagonal here.
Bethnal Green opened with fluorescent lighting: here and here.

Wow - some really interesting historic images. Oh and being monochrome saved them much hassle from issues related to the colour temperature of different types of lighting.

I am fascinated by the style of the platform lighting at Wood Green in this image



I also saw (but cannot now find) an image without a train which more clearly showed how the lights were also on the far right side of the station tunnel - with nothing on the ceiling.

[spsmiler]

Feb 13, 2021 12:37:16 GMT quex said:

Lovely images, thanks spsmiler . They really capture the "homely" feel of the Standard Stock cars.

I've always found it somewhat ironic that some of the first automated trains on the network operated with what was at the time some of the oldest rolling stock!

Thank you.

Thanks to books such as "London Underground Rolling Stock" by Brian Hardy (published by Capital Transport) I knew that the Standard Stock cars were on their last days and decided to explore and take some photos. Living near Gants Hill made the Hainault - Woodford shuttle very easy to reach. I had no concept of photo-sharing with other people - these were just for my own memories and photo album.

Already on my Flickr photostream are some later photos of these trains which were taken using a 35mm camera - but showing them after they had been repainted grey inside.

As an aside, when the automation trials began the eastern end of the Central line was still served by BR goods trains. Probably by then only hauled by diesel locomotives (not steam), nevertheless ye olde worlde goods wagons really did travel over tracks also used by 'self driving' automated trains! These finished circa 1966, which was before any of the 1967ts trains began proving trials on this route.


 

[jimbo]

The 1960TS were introduced as three 8-car prototype trains running on the main routes of the Central line. I think they were decked out in three trial interior liveries. The green and cream you show looks much like the Standard Stock looked on the line before modification. It is hard to tell how much colour variation is due to film reproduction and how much to the interior finish fading over time, especially the formica in the driving motors. The LT Museum 1938 stock train faithfully reproduces the original colours. I recall a salmon pink and pale blue train which stood out from all others on the line. I suppose the third was in 1962TS style cream and blue/grey interior livery.

[stapler]

I'll check my sources, but I think steam was still being used on the goods trains in 60 and 61, usually hauled by tripcock fitted J15s. Certainly till 1970, the early DMUs operating the Loughton to Liverpool St main station service were sharing the track with the automatic trains, as the LT notices called them.

[spsmiler]

Feb 14, 2021 8:29:18 GMT stapler said:

I'll check my sources, but I think steam was still being used on the goods trains in 60 and 61, usually l=hauled by tripcock fitted J15s. Certainly till 1970, the early DMUs operating the Loughton to Liverpool St main station service were sharing the track with the automatic trains, as the LT notices called them.

Thanks, I look forward to learning exactly when steam was replaced by diesel. 

re: the DMU's, by 1970 the goods trains were history. I wonder how the signalling system would have managed has the BR trains still been running when the route was converted to full ATO for the 1992ts.

[stapler]

The summer of 1961 is the last time I can record a J15-hauled goods on the line...

[metman]

Feb 14, 2021 4:22:48 GMT jimbo said:

The 1960TS were introduced as three 8-car prototype trains running on the main routes of the Central line. I think they were decked out in three trial interior liveries. The green and cream you show looks much like the Standard Stock looked on the line before modification. It is hard to tell how much colour variation is due to film reproduction and how much to the interior finish fading over time, especially the formica in the driving motors. The LT Museum 1938 stock train faithfully reproduces the original colours. I recall a salmon pink and pale blue train which stood out from all others on the line. I suppose the third was in 1962TS style cream and blue/grey interior livery.

I’ve read that they had a mix of colours. The salmon pink stood out in my mind too!

[t697]

I recall the 1960TS interiors looking very sad and worn when the 3 car conversions were done in the 70's. They hadn't lasted anywhere near as well as the A stocks, also from Cravens and built at the same time.

[spsmiler]

Thanks stapler for the info about the steam locos.

re: the trains with the Standard Stock, alas by the time I saw them only a few were still in service - instead they were also using some 1967ts Victoria line trains.

Therefore I never got to see the other colours.

I wonder if anyone took colour photos back then - even grainy 110 film piccies would have been better than nothing.

[jimbo]

Feb 14, 2021 4:22:48 GMT jimbo said:

The 1960TS were introduced as three 8-car prototype trains running on the main routes of the Central line. I think they were decked out in three trial interior liveries. The green and cream you show looks much like the Standard Stock looked on the line before modification. It is hard to tell how much colour variation is due to film reproduction and how much to the interior finish fading over time, especially the formica in the driving motors. The LT Museum 1938 stock train faithfully reproduces the original colours. I recall a salmon pink and pale blue train which stood out from all others on the line. I suppose the third was in 1962TS style cream and blue/grey interior livery.

Was salmon pink and pale blue also a feature of Waterloo & City interiors at one time?