SAINT MUNGO REBORN AHEAD OF ‘A1’ RETURN TO BR GREEN

A1 Trust marks 30th anniversary with celebration of new-build inspiration and a repaint.

Saint Mungo, or Tornado? New-build ‘A1’ No. 60163 has appeared as you’ve never seen it – in weathered condition replicating long-scrapped classmate No. 60145 to mark the 30th anniversary of the A1 Steam Locomotive Trust.

The makeover was undertaken in mid-August, before No. 60163 entered Carnforth’s paint shop for a surprise repaint into BR green. Tornado is to carry the latter-day BR livery rather than its more normal Apple green until its next overhaul in 2022. While it does so, the A1 Trust has said that it would “entertain” approaches to run the Peppercorn ‘Pacific’ in ‘grimy’ guise.

Trust chairman Steve Davies told Steam Railway on August 11: “We’re going into BR green and we’re open to proposals from railways that would like to have it weathered – but we won’t entertain that beyond the point it’s BR green.”

Explaining the background to the Saint Mungo ‘look’, Mr Davies said that “if that engine hadn’t been scrapped there’d be no Tornado. Saint Mungo spawned the idea.”

“It shows we’re a fun organisation – and prepared to refresh the brand.”

“We want to grab attention and reach people in quite a striking way that we’re raring to go” Mr Davies added, “and the key thing is that it’s our 30th anniversary.”

The weathering was carried out in secret at the former 10A by a team that included the chairman himself, supporter Ian Greenan and Richard Pearson. Mr Davies said that the re-creation, which included details such as a No. 60145-style white smokebox door boss as well as ‘1960s’ grime, was done using “a real photo that we’ve recreated as faithfully as we can.”

The subsequent repaint into BR express passenger green, he said, was “to get the engine immaculate in time to go to Scotland.”

“The Apple green is getting a bit tatty, and to put it back would have been seriously expensive.” Following its period of enforced idleness in storage at York during lockdown, No. 60163 is to return to public charters hauling the trust’s own Edinburgh-Aberdeen ‘Aberdonians’, the first of which is on September 3 (for more details see Down Main on page 57). Rather than its temporary grimy look, however, the ‘A1’ is expected to be bulled up and once again incorporate cosmetic details such as polished smokebox door hinges. It is to carry the later BR crest. Paint will be supplied by Craftmaster. The new-build 4-6-2 previously wore BR green in 2011 and 2012, before a repaint into BR blue.

It reverted to Apple green, as also carried from 2008, in 2015.

Speaking afterwards of the work involved in the engine’s brief impersonation of its classmate, Mr Davies said there “is something counterintuitive about applying muck rather than taking it off!”

●● With thanks to West Coast Railway Company for facilitating the front cover photoshoot.

●● For an interview with former A1 Trust chairman David Champion, see page 43.

PHIL METCALE Tormungo! A Jekyll and Hyde look for the 2008-built ‘A1’ showing how this issue’s front cover was created: its front end temporarily transformed into late BR condition as No. 60145 (Saint Mungo ), while the unseen Apple green boiler and wheels were left untouched.

JOHN ARNOTT-BROWN The original No. 60145 Saint Mungo simmers on Heaton shed on New Year’s Day 1966, the day after hauling a ‘Farewell to North Eastern Steam’ railtour between York and Newcastle. It was the last Peppercorn ‘A1’ to be withdrawn, on June 19 1966, and was subsequently scrapped by Draper’s of Hull.