Locomotives of New Zealand - Liveries

Liveries

New Zealand's locomotives have appeared in several different liveries over the ages. Steam locomotives were mainly black. When the railcars and first-generation diesels came in, they were painted in "carnation red" with a white or yellow stripe.

In the 1970s the first different livery appeared. Eleven members of the DJ class were painted "Southerner Blue" (mainly dark blue) to haul the Southerner express in the South Island. The Silver Fern railcars appeared in stainless steel, and the DX class, appearing in 1972, were painted "clockwork orange" (orange and yellow). In 1978, the rebuilt DC class appeared in "fruit salad" (red, yellow, grey and black), and many locomotives followed suit. Following the split of New Zealand Rail Limited from the New Zealand Railways Corporation in 1991, a modified livery of blue, yellow, grey and black appeared. For the first time, locomotives wore the name of their operator - New Zealand Rail - in prominent view. This livery was continued after 1993 when New Zealand Rail Limited was privatised, and was slightly modified when the company was renamed Tranz Rail in 1995 by replacing the New Zealand Rail logo with the new Tranz Rail logo and using a different tone of blue, known after Wellington-based creators, Cato Partners, who also designed brands for the divisions of Tranz Rail.

In 2001 a new livery to promote level crossing safety was trialed on DC 4323. This colour scheme was nicknamed "bumble bee" because of its black and yellow colours. Following the takeover of Tranz Rail by Australia's Toll Holdings in 2004, Toll Rail's livery appeared, nicknamed "corn cob", consisting of green and yellow. That same year, DC class (and now DFT/DFB class) locomotives being used on Auckland commuter services began wearing the MAXX livery, which was dark blue and yellow with a MAXX logo on the side. When the New Zealand Government bought Toll NZ's rail and sea operations in 2008, it rebranded them as KiwiRail and introduced its own livery, consisting of grey and red (a second version later followed). Most of today's locomotives are painted in "fruit salad", blue, "bumble bee", "corn cob" or KiwiRail.