Different Tuscan Red from Lionel

Yep, you are correct.

I have collected PRR tuscan MTH Premier passenger over the years, and I have seen different shades of tuscan like you show in the picture above.

I accept it...I am sure the real ones may have varied in hue due to time in the sun, or the paint mixture at the shop being off a smidge.

Yes, and some of the cabin car colors recently seen from Lionel are almost maroon.   

George

To my eyes, the PA looks Tuscan red, and the E8 looks Tuscan.

Ok, enough with the color, lets have a review of the new PA's.

Tuscan red is a lot like box car red is a lot like primer red is a lot like barn yard red - the exact colors are more of a suggestion than a mandate. 

Mixed Freight posted:

Tuscan red is a lot like box car red is a lot like primer red is a lot like barn yard red - the exact colors are more of a suggestion than a mandate. 

Actually, RR colors are mixed to specific standards, and are part of a railroad's standard practices, and do not vary much at all. There are people paid to be in charge of this; it's not a hobby. There is a Right and a Wrong PRR Tuscan red. ("Color creep" through time is not unknown, of course; paint technology changes; samples fade - and certainly shades are even consciously changed sometimes.)

The above does not always apply to short lines and even smaller Class 1's. 

  Complex colors are a specific pigment formula easily thrown off if the base colors vary. If the mix isn't primarys, but complex colors mixed to begin with, now your way off if the primary bases are off.

  Variences are just a sign the formula was compromised or approimated.  I.e. someone said "who cares it's close" . 

   Companies go a long way with color, patents etc. and PR depts. tend to mind them pretty close. E.g. it ain't "medium blue" it's "Ford Blue" or even "Michigan State Police Blue", etc. etc.

D500 posted:

Mixed Freight posted:

Tuscan red is a lot like box car red is a lot like primer red is a lot like barn yard red - the exact colors are more of a suggestion than a mandate. 

Actually, RR colors are mixed to specific standards, and are part of a railroad's standard practices, and do not vary much at all. There are people paid to be in charge of this; it's not a hobby. There is a Right and a Wrong PRR Tuscan red. ("Color creep" through time is not unknown, of course; paint technology changes; samples fade - and certainly shades are even consciously changed sometimes.)

The above does not always apply to short lines and even smaller Class 1's. 

So all in all D500, what you're really trying to say is.............................

Pretty much what I said to start with? 

Added the Radiophone antenna to this Weaver Model.  Badger Modelflex maroon was a close/ not exact match.

Also added the lift rings front and windshield wipers.

Looks like 2 different shades of Tuscan to me, or fading over time.  1st photo is from the 60’s on the PRSL. 2nd is from 1953. I ordered the PRR PA’s and they are in the mail. I want to see them in person in the sunlight. Anybody run theirs yet? How about a demo of the super bass B unit.

The models may only be a year apart, but the factories in China could be a thousand miles apart.

I like the PA shade truthfully. The E8 just looks brown. 

Surefire posted:

I like the PA shade truthfully. The E8 just looks brown. 

Same here

Me too.....

On a good color chart there is a Tuscan Red and a Tuscan brown.  I'd say the right look for PRR would be Medium Tuscan Red.

When Weaver still did Scalecoat. 

Badger Modelflex is one of the few paint suppliers that still does the Railroad colors.  Most model paints have abandoned model railroading. IMO.  

Mike CT posted:

Badger Modelflex is one of the few paint suppliers that still does the Railroad colors.  Most model paints have abandoned model railroading. IMO.  

Tru-color and Minuteman

Another thumbs up for the Lionel color change.  Any number of PW period color photos of freshly shopped diesels and electrics exhibit a bright Tuscan shade.  I had wondered why MTH made the change, until I began closer examination of color shots.  Now, the gloss factor should be notched up a few to represent something freshly painted rather than the factory fade job from both manufacturers.

Bruce

Sorry, I have not had time to run the locos yet.  Maybe this weekend.

Pennsy

Believe me, the Standard Railroad of the World would not allow colors from the shop to be a smidgen off!!!!

Pennsyforever

MTH, ES44AC,  Weaver E8, from the 1990, and a more recent Weaver BP20. 

I think there are a lot of factors involved.   First it has been stated a number of time by members of the Pennsylvania RR Technical and Historical society that Pennsy colors did change over time.    It has been stated that they became darker and probably maintained their color better over time.    The reason was the change in paint technology.    Better carriers were used but the color change was also the result of the movement from natural pigments to artificial pigments for the color.    So PRR tuscan red (I have never heard of tuscan brown mentioned before).    was a lighter color around WWI than Postwar WWII.    And then weathering and sun and use all affect color and fading and staining.    Older paints tended to fade quicker and more significantly.    So after a short while in service, the unit does not match an out of the shops unit.    This is true of PRR Freight car color also.    All freight cars and cabooses (cabins) were painted painted PRR Freight Car Color starting about 1920.    None were ever painted a version of tuscan.    Prior to that sometime - perhpas pre-WWI, cabooses were painted bright red - a version of Caboose red.  

A story about this involving PRR Dark Green Loco Enanamel (DGLE).    A friend of mine grew up in the Columbus Ohio area and saw a lot of first generation diesels as a young man and teenager.    He said he always thought they were paint dark Blue!     The sun fading and weathering and where he saw them, tended to give them a blue tinge rather than dark green.

Finally a third thought of mine.    I worked in the steel industry a long time and then auto mfg.    I was in a lot of industrial sites as an Industrial engineer.    Industrial equipement was expensive and it was painted to maintain it mostly.   some safety paint was done too.    But the paint was put on to extend the life of the equipment, not make pretty.     The company ordered paint from a supplier - often in 55 gallon drums (industruial stuff is big), and had it delivered.    The guy ordering in purchasing specified a color based on a paint chip and followed the standard practices.    The guys in the shop opened the drum, and put it on the machine, device whatever.    They did not recheck the color or validate or even care what color it was.    It was paint and it went on the machines - they applied it properly.     I think the PRR as an industrial complex did the same thing.    They used whatever paint showed up.    It the mfg was a little off for some reason, the shop guys never noticed.    Probably there was a little more notice for Passenger stuff, at least up  until about 1955 or so, but it is still industrial stuff.

Wow, what I would give for a lionel Passenger Shark Nose!!!

Pennsyforever

Lionel uses Pantone colors for their painting diagrams.  To start the Pantone system is limited so an exact color match isn't possible to start.  Factor in that paint manufacturers around the world use different types of paint bases.  Depending on what factory painted it, there could be a range of drift off of the specified color.  It is not surprising to see runs vary in color, but the question of how much variation is really the issue. 

When using modeling paint, it also ages in the bottle and the color shifts.  A 20 year old bottle of Scale Coat unopened will be a different color than an opened one.

As others have mentioned, PRR Tuscan Red did drift over the years and comparing photographs is not an accurate way to get the right color.  Exposure, film type, lighting, and how it was printed doesn't help us as modelers at all.   Add the challenge  that color film has about a 25 year life span unless it was shot on Kodachrome which is closer to 50 years.  The color shifts on actual film and eventually fades away after that initial life span.

My favorite example is a member of this forum who has the keystone herald off a B60B in his train room from when it was scrapped.  It includes the entire body panel with it.  Every conceivable color of Tuscan Red in this one 2'x2' steel plate.

Long answer to stating why it is very difficult to match colors in general unless original drift cards can be found.  For the PRRT&HS, they have spent many, many years in discussion over "correct".