I have a spare plastic boiler in G scale for my Challenger. I always said I would paint it and practice weathering it. I'm off to a bad start.
This morning I grabbed a trove of paint cans that were blacks and greys and started outside for a quick base spray job. I shot the far end of the boiler with a can of grey primer that looked really good to me at first. It looked like gun metal grey but was way too dark. So I then grabbed another brand of paint and it was the exact same shade. So in a rush while it was semi- warm out, I grabbed a third can of stone grey and ran out to paint again. This was a light grey that ended up too light and too glossy.
I have since realized just how well MTH did on painting the ends of the G scale challengers. Even though they are plastic, they have a decent metal look to them. It's like they blended grey with silver to get it right. I was going to use heavy weathering anyways so maybe I'll be alright. I had pictured the usual grey primer for metals being lighter in color and a flat finish. I wished I had stuck with the first dark grey coat I used. Being flat, it looked more realistic.
You can see the darker grey first use as an overspray area around the light grey that was sprayed:
and the color I wanted: Maybe I can weather and spray over with a flat clear?
