General Discussion (Model Railroader)

CSmith,

Thanks for the idea on window shades and using sheet styrene. It makes sense that styrene would adhere much better to plastic than cardstock. I've seen white styrene at various hobby shops. I want to try window shades on some of the Rivorossi passenger cars that I'm currently detailing to better match the Walthers Budds.

Roger that.

Any color suggestions for my passenger trains? Chicago & Alton, Great Northern Empire Builder, Southern heavyweights, and Chessie Steam Fan Trippers? Also early AMTRAK?

How do you guys find all this stuff?

Rotor

Great thread this. Antonio mentioned that the California Zephyr Dome cars had yellow and white seats, did these colours apply to the other cars in the consist.?
What other colours were employed, for the walls, floor etc? There are only black and white photos in the books I have and I have not found any colour pictures on the web.
william

Will,

I'll look through my photos. I'll come back and edit this post with info. Hopefully my photos will show the details you're asking about.

Peace!

Thanks Antonio, look forward to seeing the photos.
This morning I got a book called Streamliners by Mike Schafer and Joe Welsh.. There were a number of photos of interiors in coulor, but not from the California Zephyr. Otherwise it's a lovely book with lots of great pictures. Makes you dream.
William

I just spent last night building an interior for a Santa Fe 4-4-2 Regal sleeper. Looks alright. I also recently built an interior for a P/S baggage dormitory. I found that .020 styrene works fairly well. I am about to do a Palm interior which is a 10-6 (which equals a pain in the behind). Is Red Cap still doing interior details?

QUOTE: Originally posted by Rotorranch Any color suggestions for my passenger trains? Chicago & Alton, Great Northern Empire Builder, Southern heavyweights, and Chessie Steam Fan Trippers? Also early AMTRAK? How do you guys find all this stuff? Rotor

Rotor,

I may be able to help you on the Chessie steam trip cars as I rode them in 1981 and took some photos. I'll post the info later along with Will-O after I look at the photos. I wish I had a scanner so I can post them on this forum.

As for how we find this stuff, it's easy. Looking through personal photos, visiting musuems or tourist lines in any town I stop in (my poor wife puts up with it), looking at photos on websites and in books. I was amazed at how many streamlined and heavyweight passenger cars are preserved in Florida and Georgia alone. Many times they're in tiny out of the way towns on the map. Anytime I hear of passenger equipment present near a town I'm visiting, I'll take a "little detour" to check it out.

I just found out yesterday that there are two ex-Seaboard Airline passenger cars preserved at Boca, Raton Florida. So next time I go to Miami to visit my cousin, "I'll likely take a little detour!".

What got me started on this thread is that years ago I saw a Marklin HO passenger car with a beautifully detailed interior, complete with colors! I stared at this car for the longest. It dawned on me years later that painting the cheap IHC kits would make a big difference.

Peace!

Cool, Antonio! Looking forward to getting this info, as I'm about to commence building my IHC interior kits for "The Kid's" Chessie Fan Trip train. It'll be cool to do it in the correct colors!

Rotor

Hi Guys!

Had to dig through my photos.

California Zephyr -
A Zephyr dome-observation car was brought to Tampa back in 1981 and was opened to the public. Sorry, but I must make a "Correction" on my earlier post regarding the California Zephyr car that I shot. The seats have a yellow cloth placed on top of the back sections , (I assume to protect the seat backs from hair sweat.) The seats themselves are actually a light green.

I looked at my model paint charts.
No exact match in Floquil, but Badger ModelFlex #16-47 Light Green is almost right on the mark. Model Flex is pretty thin, so you may be better off airbrushing your seats.
Now, the head/back cloth section cover (which would require a very tiny paint brush) would be Erie Lackawanna Yellow. (available in Floquil, and Model Flex).

The interior walls are the typical light beige found in many streamline era cars. Floquil and Model Flex have the colors. A mix of 3 parts Antique White and one part Reefer Yellow would be close.

The skeletal framework walls in the glass dome,however, are white! That threw me for a loop. As always, use flat not gloss.

The floor is carpeted. Dark Gray with swirl patterns of green, black, and light gray. Looks like typical office carpet. Floors usually can't be seen, so I don't bother painting mine. For a dome section, however, it might not be a bad idea.

Chessie excursion cars.
I took an interior photo of car #5 which is a smooth sided heavyweight coach that I rode in when the #614 steamer came into town.

The seats are a dark Red/Brown. In Floquil the closest color appears to be #60163 Santa Fe Mineral Brown. In ModelFlex it would be #16-14.

The interior walls and ceiling: Light beige colors, almost identical to the Zephyr car though. I would go with the same or similar color mix.

Again guys, these are only my opinions based on photos taken with a 35mm, no flash during daylight hours. Continue to do your research as well and if your results are different, by all means post them here. Sometimes thumbing through old issues of TRAINS or other magazines will yield results.

Hope this helps!

Thanks a million Antonio. As soon as the postman brings the interiors I ordered I'll get painting. If I do a good job I'll take some photos and post them here.
Thanks again
William

Looking forward to it, William!

Since this topic keeps getting brought back to life...

Here's some questions for you:
Colors of objects if possible:
Walls, Seats, Floor, Vestibule

New York Central Heavyweight interior colors?
For the long distance heavyweights, I was told dark gray carpet with light gray seats and a red stripe down the center of the carpet. Walls and vestibules were a beige color. What about the commuter cars? I remember someone telling me the floors were lineoleum(what color is that?) and red seats...but unsure of shade.

Southern Two Tone Green Crescent?
I was told a dark green floor with a pullmanish/light green seats

Pullman (or Nickel Plate Road) Heavyweight Combine and Diner Lounge:

I have the interior colors for N&W's Powhattan Arrow at my house. I am currently in my dorm, but when I return I will give you the specs that I have for each type of car that I got from the Purple Norfolk and Western Handbook.

A website I just came across tonight had color interior pictures of cars from: Canadian National, CB&Q, Milwaukee Road, and Southern Pacific.

http://www.jerryapp.com/arcv_idx.html

I also have some random interior colors I got from a few books that I was trying to research interio colors from at the NCSU Library:
-Southern Railway:
Coach...outside seat red, inside seat gray, walls a medium jade green

-Empire State:
colors used...but on what? mullberry, evergreen, brown, and marine blue

-20th Century Limited:
clublounge car: walls - gray leather, couches blue leather and the shades match the exterior, them being light shades

-Southern Pacific Daylight:
SP had special names for their colors: Russian Tan, Broken White, Nantes Blue, Cocoa Beige, Jonquil Yellow; each car had six basic colors, darkest on floors, medium at walls, and lighting on cieling

-B&O's Royal Blue:
light color walls, chromium tublur furntiure and linoleum
chairs in lounge: red, brown, and green frieze
coach and parlor: rust and red frieze with neutal ivory seats

-Santa Fe's Super Chief:
observation lounge: turqoise cieling, red chairs w/ blue and white patterns
diner: chairs - red -orange leather; carpet was same color but with black accents
also each car had its own little theme

-M-1000 City of Saline:
chairs - golden brown

-Pullman (not sure of what car tho...possibly Mainline Coach):
beige/yellow walls, maroon floor in vestibules and bathroom, myrtle green seats, white sinks and toilets

-L&N's The Georgian:
upholstery shades of browns and reds, maroon rugs, ivory walls and cielings
diner/parlors #2800-2801:red booths, black counters, blue/grey floor

-Clinchfield:
obs/lounge: grey floor, walls are beige, blue and maroon seats, white table tops w/ silver sides, white walls

Those are just some tidbits I was able to scan from about 10-20 different books. No one really seemed to keep tabs on or care about the interior colors.

Thanks for the tips and ideas.

Any idea of the interior colours of Heawyweight Pullman sleeper cars?

Specially walls enf floor.

And did someone try to build from scrap (cardboard/stirene sheets) the interior of MDC 50' Overland sleeping/businnes cars? Any suggestion?

Thank you

sebastiano

The trouble with detailing the interiors is that it will draw the eye the which almost requires the addition of passengers which can add a lot of expense, even if you start with unpainted figures. Otherwise it will be obvious that your passenger trains are running empty. Sometimes, you can add too much detail. My rule of thumb is to detail those elements that I want to draw attention too. I don't want to draw attention to my empty passenger cars.

Jecorbett,

You make a valid point.

For me the problem is that when I look at the beautiful Walthers Cars, those plain "mono-colored" interior seats, tables, and partitions drive me nuts! That's distracting. I've found that with painted interiors, passenger cars look so much more realistic, even if empty.

But for those that don't want to paint their interiors, tinting the windows and adding window shades may work quite well.

High Greens