Anyone paint their "GREEN" scale Lionel water tower?

I did that same thing to mine.

 I have put a tortis switch macheen in it to make the spout go down and a relay to make a sound board turn on with the sound of water tower and running water.

Wow!  Does that ever look so much better.  And yes, i would love to know how you did it.

Thanks for posting,

Don

Such a nicely detailed water tower and your paintwork is a HUGE improvement.

Of course we want the details.

Ok, here is the quick run down. I will try to add photos of the steps:

First is to purchase your paint. I used flat camouflage black and tan for this repaint, purchased at my friendly neighborhood Napa auto parts store.

I did all painting outside on a warm non windy day.

Remove the roof and ladder. I painted these black and left them to dry.

Next remove the interior screws of the tank to wood structure base and remove the lower tank pipe.

Take a standard screw driver and gently pry off the front pipe and chain details that are pre attached to the frame and press fit onto the tank. These come off easier if you work around in stages

I removed the gray Pedestals on the bottom of the wood support structure. They are screwed in with small Phillips screws

Next Paint the wood structure and Tank with the light Tan camouflage paint, let dry for a couple of hours, Make sure you get good coverage on those shiny copper bands. 

Next I used burnt umber and mars black acrylic artist paints and used a brush and painted the legs. brush strokes are good here so don't worry about them, it will build up a wood grain look.

Don't  worry about full coverage, if the light tan is visible this will add to the realism.

Next take the tank and use the same paint but with more of a wash mix and paint up and down on the tank, dry brush techniques work well here too, go slow, work multiple applications with thin washes as well.

Next take the spout and chain assembly, Paint the chain, spout, pulleys, and dry brush the wood frame with grimey black paint

let dry, and apply again if needed, don't forget the counter weights.

Paint the bottom tank pipe as well.

Let dry over night

Paint all the pedestal feet with aged concrete paint. 

Let them dry

Now the hard part. use a fine tip brush and paint the rings of the tank in grimey black, have another brush ready with water incase you mess up. The brush with the water will immediately wash the grimey black into the tank boards and you can continue to paint the wire bands.

The above took some time and patience.

Next reassemble everything. Apply chalks (dark brown and rust colors to the spout, chain and pivots) Add lighter chalks to the wood structure, add rust chalks to the bands on the tank using the dry brush technique.

I will post some pictures 

That water tower looks great!

Wow! That looks very realistic. Great job. And thanks a lot for the how-to. I want to pick one of these towers up and give it a try.

excellent post-I redid my mth op.water tower 2 weeks ago-painted barrel part-medium grey-roof was easy-ladder and roof hatch pop off-painted roof-flat black-roof hatch and small ladder-light grey-took long ladder off barrel-4 tiny screws-painted flat brown.

I masked off spout support frame and water meature strip-white-painted with flat

paint-medium grey-rings included-by hand too-came out better than I thought-since the paint I used was water soluable-i spray a flat clear coat over barrel and rings to seal-I use the matt clear on the semi shiny plastic legs-chains are easy-paited a medium grey.patience is the main factor-

I really like your tower-that tan p-aint on the barrel art and rings makes it looik

fantastic.

J Daddy;

That is awesome work. I really like the bands and woodwork.

For those that want the green (A copper tank will turn that color over time)

Disassemble as posted and use matte medium or dull coat as desired to kill the sheen. The tank can have some sheen if it's oxidized copper, just not as much as it starts with. The wood should not have any shine.

A bit of reddish brown crud weathered down from the couplings on the bands or even a bit under the bands will be appropriate.

Fantastic job.

Thanks guys for the compliments, this one has a happy ending.

Yeah this model needs the dull coat... it just hurt the eyes being on the layout as is.