I am working on creating a passenger train representative of the Northern Pacific's North Coast Limited as would have run between December of 1948 and September of 1949. Where I am running into a problem is matching paint. I am using the NP F unit diagrams as shown in the November 1993 MR Paint Shop as my color basis. The article suggests using the old Floquil colors of Pullman Green (110045) and Reading Green (110083). Using a chart released by Microscale, those colors cross to Humbrol Light Olive (86) and US Dark Green (116). When I painted a couple of test swatches on a piece of white styrene, the colors that resulted don't seem to match the colors in the diagram. I know that the colors don't match the lighter green of the diagram and I can't tell which of the colors matches the other green. If I was pinned down, I would guess the Light Olive matches the darker green. But the Dark Green definitely doesn't match. Any ideas to better match the lighter green in the Humbrol line (matt prefered) would be welcomed. Thank you for any assistance the forum can provide.
You may have to mix your own. I've done it. It's not hard, and it is VERY rewarding if/when you get an exact match. Also, you might have a favorite brand of paint that you like working with. So, even if another brand has an exact match, it may be very irritating to learn to use a new paint.
It's possible that your subject color is not matchable with your particular brand of paint. This can happen when you can't get bright or intense enough colors to blend with. It's pretty easy to make a color less intense. It's almost impossible to make it more intense.
When I did it, I measured out various ratios of suspect colors into an old glass ash tray. I then dipped in a white strip of cardboard or styrene. I let the paint dry. I then spit on my mix sample and on the color sample I was after. This curious process I used because it is VERY important to have the level of gloss (or flatness) equal when comparing colors. If'n yer not inta spittin', pardner, you could likely spray the two with the same gloss. This can be a real problem, though, when you "original" color is on a model. Anyway, it worked for me.
Oh, yeah. You might consider getting a set of color drift cards from the NP historical society. They are the exact colors or the originals.
Ed
7j43k You may have to mix your own. I've done it. It's not hard, and it is VERY rewarding if/when you get an exact match. Also, you might have a favorite brand of paint that you like working with. So, even if another brand has an exact match, it may be very irritating to learn to use a new paint.
My luck with mixing paints is not very good. I aim for a specific color and, at least when working with model paints, I miss completely.
Unfortunately, the paints that I loved to work with were discontinued by the company that made them and I still haven't really found anything that equals the quality and ease of use of that paint and the color match. The small amount of the Humbrol paints that I used hit on the quality and ease of use but not so much on the color matching
7j43k It's possible that your subject color is not matchable with your particular brand of paint. This can happen when you can't get bright or intense enough colors to blend with. It's pretty easy to make a color less intense. It's almost impossible to make it more intense. When I did it, I measured out various ratios of suspect colors into an old glass ash tray. I then dipped in a white strip of cardboard or styrene. I let the paint dry. I then spit on my mix sample and on the color sample I was after. This curious process I used because it is VERY important to have the level of gloss (or flatness) equal when comparing colors. If'n yer not inta spittin', pardner, you could likely spray the two with the same gloss. This can be a real problem, though, when you "original" color is on a model. Anyway, it worked for me.
Using the white styrene is what I painted the samples on. Given that most of the equipment on the train either use Brass Car Sides, will need to be repainted anyway, or is undecorated (the engines), matching existing doesn't apply. As it will be donated and looked at mostly by non-railroaders when done, as long as the colors look close to the pics and diagrams that I have will work.
7j43k Oh, yeah. You might consider getting a set of color drift cards from the NP historical society. They are the exact colors or the originals. Ed
If worse comes to worse, I know where I can "borrow" a set of those drift cards from.
I was studying the problem last night and remembered that I had soem extra bottles of Polly Scale green that I obtained when I purchased a lot on eBay for a bottle of the green that I use for my regular layout. In examining the colors I found that the Coach Green is a resonable green that is between the greens that are on the diagram stripe and the green stripe on an IHC 10-1-1 that I have modified with some New England Rail Supply windows to change it to an 8-1-2. Given that the old PS paint and the Humbrol seem to have the same quality and brushability, I might end up using them together.