Lionel Prewar Marker lights

Lionel Die cast headlights were always one side painted green, the other red.

Chuck Sartor posted:

Lionel Die cast headlights were always one side painted green, the other red.

I understand that, as I have many engine with cast headlights.
Just want to know why and the logic behind the paint scheme?

Thanks:
RonH

They were made as toys.
I think it was in Ron Hollander's book where it was stated that Lionel decorated many of their trains to be colorful and attractive to the ladies. They were the ones who often bought the trains for the kids.

Back in the day Lionel wasn't to concerned about accuracy.  The standard gauge had a green marker light bulb on the left and a red on the right. I don't mind it.  It adds color. 

  Being colorful is the likely answer, but I've read two other things on the red/green combo. One was, it noted how to pass a sided train somewhere, pre-rule book. The other was some PRR crews would do it on Christmas

 Not tin, but my 2037 had one jewel of each color it's whole life and never had lost one that I remember .

Decided to have some fun and painted both sides of the front headlight in green and painted the rear light sides in red plus there will be a red bulb in the rear light of the loco. The engine has been painted in the Orange/Blue Lionel colors. Will post the pictures in a different post later this week under Lionel #8 rebuild.

RonH posted:

Decided to have some fun and painted both sides of the front headlight in green and painted the rear light sides in red plus there will be a red bulb in the rear light of the loco. The engine has been painted in the Orange/Blue Lionel colors. Will post the pictures in a different post later this week under Lionel #8 rebuild.

Looking foward to seeing how it turned out!   Did you go with the large pantograph? 

Chris Lonero posted:

RonH posted:

Decided to have some fun and painted both sides of the front headlight in green and painted the rear light sides in red plus there will be a red bulb in the rear light of the loco. The engine has been painted in the Orange/Blue Lionel colors. Will post the pictures in a different post later this week under Lionel #8 rebuild.

Looking foward to seeing how it turned out!   Did you go with the large pantograph? 

Not sure on what pantaograph I will be using. You are correct on the room that I have with this loco. Maybe a "O" gauge pantograph, they are a bit smaller and look like they are black not brass will have to see if there is any options., I also saw where this was used and the person used beads for the 4 insulators coming down. If I used this I will still try to mount with the existing hole

Perhaps  this may have been taken from the use of 'boat' colors . 'Port' & 'Starboard' colors I think are red to right and green to left?  Harry

Harry Henning posted:

Perhaps  this may have been taken from the use of 'boat' colors . 'Port' & 'Starboard' colors I think are red to right and green to left?  Harry

Hi Harry, I thought so to until I looked it up. For Marine use, port is on the left side and is red as starboard is on the right side and the color is green. The pre-war cast lights are painted in the opposite as red is on the right and green is on the left. There are some interesting sites on this explaining om how the names location of port and starboard were created. 

Here is a simple explanation:
http://www.happychild.org.uk/acc/tpr/mne/1198ptst.htm.

I think that when Lionel created the lights they made all of them the same with red on the right and green on the left. By doing this it allowed for bright colors (as posted before) and allowing only one inventory item for both ends, saving another part number and assembly mistakes.
Plus no one really know what is the front or rear of a prewar electric type loco.
I chose to have my # 8 with the reversing switch in the front and painted the two sides of the cast headlight green and the rear of the loco will have a red bulb and the two side of the cast headlight will be painted red.
This is a silly subject and just having fun with what I have and trying to get some logic and a education with it.

Thanks:
Ronh

Let me try, Marker will be displayed to the rear of every train to indicate the rear of a train. So unless the engine is running backwards  as a train the lights are not really markers. (probably class lights)

If they were markers here's the rule.... On two tracks when standing or running against the current of traffics . markers  lighted displaying red to the rear on the outside and green to rear between tracks.

Thank goodness train orders are long gone. 

Gregg posted:

Let me try, Marker will be displayed to the rear of every train to indicate the rear of a train. So unless the engine is running backwards  as a train the lights are not really markers. (probably class lights)

If they were markers here's the rule.... On two tracks when standing or running against the current of traffics . markers  lighted displaying red to the rear on the outside and green to rear between tracks.

Thank goodness train orders are long gone. 

Thank you Gregg, I m sure that on these prewar locos and the people who got them thought that any light plus additional color was the greatest thing going. Also these prewar locos have flag stations, hmm? What color flags do I use (this could start something, just kidding

Thanks:
RonH

RonH posted:

Gregg posted:

Let me try, Marker will be displayed to the rear of every train to indicate the rear of a train. So unless the engine is running backwards  as a train the lights are not really markers. (probably class lights)

If they were markers here's the rule.... On two tracks when standing or running against the current of traffics . markers  lighted displaying red to the rear on the outside and green to rear between tracks.

Thank goodness train orders are long gone. 

Thank you Gregg, I m sure that on these prewar locos and the people who got them thought that any light plus additional color was the greatest thing going. Also these prewar locos have flag stations, hmm? What color flags do I use (this could start something, just kidding

Thanks:
RonH

Well in their 1935 Replacement Parts list, Lionel offered either two White P/N 390-76 (Steam) or four White 381-93 (Electric).

Ron M

Flyer Wide Gauge had one red and one wile  painted representations of class lights early, then two green late. I think its for colors as well... The real headlights that both Flyer and Lionel modeled are based on Pyle National Models and in almost all cases the side panels had the locomotive number  on a painted glass panel insert there.

Could any group of Lionel locomotives be possibly missing more marker lights than my beloved steam switchers?

Tom