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I'm about to clean up and maybe paint some locos and parts 1946-48 vintage.  I have a couple of 1948-49 locos that I can sue as a baseline for the appearance of satin black.  Krylon is a good match.  I used it to paint a 16666 and that looks like the same shade as some of the later engines.

I have a 1946 224 and a steam chest from a 1666.  Both have no sheen at all and look like they could have been flat black, or maybe that's just aging.

My question is whether there was a change in Lionel's locomnotive paint between 1946 and 1947.  Does the satin black go back to prewar ?

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I think most all of the steam chests were blackened, not painted. They will look flat compared with the rest of the engine. When new they were probably a deep black but most lighten with age. They were probably done with a hot black treatment. 

Cold bluing compounds don't match. At least I haven't found any yet that do and have tried anout half dozen of them.

Maybe a gunsmith who restores guns could help here.

Pete

Last edited by Norton

Thanks Pete.  That's what I expected to hear, but I like to confirm what I think before writing eBay descriptions or painting parts.  I have some extra steam chest/cylinder castings that look terrible.  I'm going to paint them before listing for sale.

I hope you will list them as repainted.

When new they were probably a deep black but most lighten with age.

In my experience, it is common for the steam chests / cowcatchers to take on a green tinge.

The few times I've painted postwar Lionel steam engines, I've used Black Satin paint, made by Charlie Woods. I have always felt the paint was the cheapest component, with labor being #1.|

I painted the steam chests.
I don't know of anything that does a decent job blackening ZAMAC parts .

C W Burfle posted:

Thanks Pete.  That's what I expected to hear, but I like to confirm what I think before writing eBay descriptions or painting parts.  I have some extra steam chest/cylinder castings that look terrible.  I'm going to paint them before listing for sale.

I hope you will list them as repainted.

When new they were probably a deep black but most lighten with age.

In my experience, it is common for the steam chests / cowcatchers to take on a green tinge.

The few times I've painted postwar Lionel steam engines, I've used Black Satin paint, made by Charlie Woods. I have always felt the paint was the cheapest component, with labor being #1.|

I painted the steam chests.
I don't know of anything that does a decent job blackening ZAMAC parts .

Yes, I do list them as painted.  

Norton posted:

I think most all of the steam chests were blackened, not painted. They will look flat compared with the rest of the engine. When new they were probably a deep black but most lighten with age. They were probably done with a hot black treatment. 

Cold bluing compounds don't match. At least I haven't found any yet that do and have tried anout half dozen of them.

Maybe a gunsmith who restores guns could help here.

Pete

I've seen a lot, maybe too many, of steam chests recently.  They do seem to look different from the boilers.  Having said that, time for a trip to the basement to check a few .............. and from what I see, it looks like Pete is right.  On the 224, the cykinders don't have the sheen of the boiler.  Three others from a 1666, 2026 and 2018 also look flat.  

I have a 1666 that I fixed up for a layout for my grandchildren several years ago, before I got into serious learning about these beautiful engines.  It's now home - teenagers these days are not easily interested in trains.  Naturally, the whole thing is satin black, and that is the one I'm keeping for my collection (i'm collecting the 1946-49 catalog items).  I think I'll swap the steam chest pon that one for the one I mentioned above and sell the painted steam chest.  I'll mention that it was painted, but I have a feeling that a lot of the eBay buyers don't care as long as it looks better than the damaged item they are replacing.

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