I am planning the colors for my Southern Railway freight fleet and was considering having my freight cars painted black. I have never seen any real cars painted black, and was wondering if I painted mine black if it would look odd. Is black just a color you don't paint freight cars or is there a rhyme or reason to it(heat absorbtion). I was thinking painting the car black, with a white door.
Do you think it would be odd to have black freight cars?
-Smoke
The Lehigh & New England RR didn't think so!
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A good ol' 'Green Light' boxcar seems to work best...
But, hey, its your layout.
From the far, far reaches of the wild, wild west I am: rtpoteet
I just purchased some yellow SCL decals that go on a black 50' boxcar.
Rick
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The paint scheme wil be this one with a black paint instead on red paint, since it seems "normal".
Smoke,
It's 100% your call and your railroad, so you can do what you please, but I just have to ask, being the die-hard prototyper I am...
If you don't mind my asking, why, when you know what color the prototype used, are you planning on using a non-prototype color? Just curious.
Dave Vollmer wrote: Smoke,It's 100% your call and your railroad, so you can do what you please, but I just have to ask, being the die-hard prototyper I am...If you don't mind my asking, why, when you know what color the prototype used, are you planning on using a non-prototype color? Just curious.
Dave,
Since I am modeling modern day Southern Railway I figured they would have started to paint freight cars a different color as some point in time. I thought black cars would look cool. since I don't model a "true" prototype I can paint them whatever i want. I thought about it and thought black would look "the best" You got any suggestions as to what would be a beter color? I'm all ears for suggetions(except for pink and purple).
No offense intended! But if I did offer a suggestion, it would be to look at what NS is doing today. After all, NS is the merger of N&W and SOU (I know, among others), yet NS is doing boxcar red (a la SOU, as opposed to black per N&W). It seems less likely that an independent SOU would emulate N&W by switchng to black. Just a thought.
Of course, SOU did have those beautiful Crescent Green (is that what it was called?) steamers... A green boxcar with imitation gold lettering (like a "heritage" scheme on a modern car) might look really good! I kind of liked the Reading's last boxcar sheme (green with yellow lettering).
Again, it's 100% up to you! Good luck!
Economics play a huge part in deciding on a paint scheme for your locos and rolling stock. Of course you want to put the larger amounts of money into the equipment that costs the most like your locomotives so they tend to get the fancier more elaborate paint. You can see how this goes when a rail raod has more money the locos look "better" but as the railroad declines the paint jobs become alot more simple, just look at the Pennsy.
Now for rolling stock you usually see some uniformity in types of stock that are being painted. Some railroads have a standard that all boxcars, gondolas, tanks...etc must be painted, while others just use what is cheapest. Red Oxide, also known as Boxcar red or boxcar brown is a very cheap and easy color to produce, and fairly easy to maintain. Black is also easy to produce but shows dirt and grime better so it requires a little more to keep clean and nice looking.
All and all the color you choose is your choice. I am planning on using Black and WC Maroon for my locos and no decision yet on my SMRY rolling stock colors but I am going to take what I want my small railroads econimic situation to be as part of the deciding factors.
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Remeber what Henry Ford said- "They can have it any colour they want, as long as its black!"
Go for it!
Smoke wrote: Dave Vollmer wrote: Smoke,It's 100% your call and your railroad, so you can do what you please, but I just have to ask, being the die-hard prototyper I am...If you don't mind my asking, why, when you know what color the prototype used, are you planning on using a non-prototype color? Just curious.Dave,Since I am modeling modern day Southern Railway I figured they would have started to paint freight cars a different color as some point in time. I thought black cars would look cool. since I don't model a "true" prototype I can paint them whatever i want. I thought about it and thought black would look "the best" You got any suggestions as to what would be a beter color? I'm all ears for suggetions(except for pink and purple).
If you want to paint your cars black, then paint them black. However, the trend seems to be railroads going toward "boxcar red" or similar colors. UP is an example of this, and ATSF was another. Also, BNSF used to paint their some, perhaps half, of its cars green. It seems like all of the new car and repaints, with the exception of some covered hoppers, are a brownish color.
"No soup for you!" - Yev Kassem (from Seinfeld)
I have to say that I notice less and less Armour Yellow and Cascade Green out there lately, which I miss. Oxide Red and Brown seems to be the Class I colors of choice for freight cars these days.
Regarding black cars though, aren't a lot of gondolas still painted black? And is there a specific reason for that choice of color?
All but a small 2-digit percentage of my freight cars are painted black - which was standard for my prototype. The exceptions:
Reporting marks and information stencils are white on dark colored cars and black on lighter cars. That yellow tank has some bright red stenciling - I wonder why.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Dave Vollmer wrote:Smoke,It's 100% your call and your railroad, so you can do what you please, but I just have to ask, being the die-hard prototyper I am...If you don't mind my asking, why, when you know what color the prototype used, are you planning on using a non-prototype color? Just curious.
I guess I will paint all my steamers bright pink...
uh.., no, don't go there....
I seem to recall some Southern boxcars (and maybe other types of cars?) were delivered with black ends, but "brown" sides. Many tank cars (not just Southern) are black. Southern had quite a few black flatcars and gons. Their wrecking equipment was black (not just the crane, usually the whole train). And of course, after the late 50's, their locomotives were black (though green did make a comeback on some passenger equipment). Some of their covered and open hoppers were black (though I think they might have been company service cars, I don't recall). They also painted to roofs on some passenger cars black (this seemed random, I suspect it was for cars whose roofs had been patched for leaks, and the paint was to cover the work.)
Brad
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ALCO - Always Leaking Coolant and Oil
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jktrains wrote:N&W had black boxcars.
and CNW aquired some of them... changing them to CNW by adding a BIG C to the paint job.
dinwitty wrote: Dave Vollmer wrote: Smoke,It's 100% your call and your railroad, so you can do what you please, but I just have to ask, being the die-hard prototyper I am...If you don't mind my asking, why, when you know what color the prototype used, are you planning on using a non-prototype color? Just curious. I guess I will paint all my steamers bright pink...uh.., no, don't go there....
"There" being the 1970s and usually some eye-jaring bright pink leased covered hoppers in the mid west.
I have a few and they really do weird things to the appearance of a train.
May railroads had/have black coal hoppers..makes sense to have a car that carrys coal (very dirty) painted black!
http://www.toltecimages.com/trains/later%20images/5609.jpg
http://www.outdoorrailways.com/Products/USA%20Trains/3bay_hoppers/r14007.jpg
http://www.morscher.com/rr/2005/20050329_01.jpg
http://www.ourbc.com/travel_bc/bc_cities/vancouver_coast/photos/lytton/coal_train_01_640.jpg
Scot
GAPPLEG wrote:SP had overnights that were black , so no , not so odd.
Like GAPPLEG said, SP had black overnights and also black gondolas, C&O had black box cars with silver doors also. If I think of any others I'll come back and add them to the list.
Tracklayer
Black boxcars weren't that common, but many railroads painted gondolas, flats and hopper cars black. Northern Pacific ore cars were black.
BTW as to why you see so many brownish-red RR cars...Way back in the 1800's the cost of the paint you used was determined by how it was made. Before artificial colors came along in 1859, paint colors were made by using 'organic' materials, like certain plants. "Royal Blue" and purple were "royal" colors because the colors came from sea creatures, so they were very rare and therefore cost a lot - only royalty could afford it.
The cheapest paint was dark red, which was dirt cheap because it was made with, well...dirt. Soil or red clay with iron ore in it, which is common in many areas of the world. This red was also long lasting and tough as a paint, so freight cars, barns, anything exposed to the elements were painted that color. When artificial colors came along there was an explosion of colors, but "tuscan red" has continued to be a popular freight car color.