Paint color crosschart??

Good luck. The EPA has made it **** tough for the paint manufactures to produce

model paints. They have all had to change there formulas.

I do not know if there is a cross reference if there is it is 20+ years old. It wont work.

Marty

It is tough, but auto paint manufacturers have surmounted the difficulty - I can still buy Rangoon Red off the shelf.  Aircraft paint is now impossible to match by simply ordering.  When I paint "PiperCub Yellow" I have to mix my own.

Model paints have always been slightly different from brand to brand.  It is not difficult to mix your own - and for O Scale kits, you may be able to use rattle can red primer to match many of the boxcar red kits from All Nation and Athearn.  The most difficult, in my opinion, is the SP reefer orange - that one takes some talent to mix.

I've had similar difficulties, not-as-much with railroad colors, but when matching plastic colors used by various toy manufacturers.
About 7 years ago, I went to a (1980s-2000s) G.I. Joe customizing group that had among its shared information, a chart with close matches to colors Hasbro used on their favorite Real American Heroes.
All of the paints listed were FolkArt, Apple Barrel, and other acryllic paints that could be bought at several hobby stores (and Wal-Mart) for between 50 cents and $1.25. Over time, some colors were discontinued, including one color I needed for skintone mixes, and a silver I'd been using.
Since I also wanted to customize Transformers parts, I had to use the same technique to find matches for their parts. My two pieces of advice are as follows:

1. Never underestimate the power of a good primer.
2. When you've cooked up the perfect match, share your process and the names of the colors you used in a message board (or two) like this one.

     -- Señor J.

It's an excellent question. I too have several of the older model kits which did have color matching requirements to make the roof and ends match to the prepainted sides. A little off and it definitely shows too. I think I will probably mix and test until I get something that my eyes are ok with. Not ready to do that just yet however.

Bob

My suggestion would be to get as close a match as possible using any of the model paints.  This may or may not take a little while as paint always seems to dry at a slighty different tint.  There will be a slight change in tint also if you brush, versus spray the area, or parts in question.  Plus, if you Dullcoat the car, and weather it, this will "hide' any differences in paint color.   A friend of mine always says, "weathering hides a multitude of sins!"......

I think the cross charts mentioned were the Diesel Color Charts and Mixes in the  Model Railroader Bluebook page series that ran in the late 50's and early 60's.  You got a drawing of the loco and a series of paint mixes for the brands available at the time.  Floquil is the only one still around and who knows what the colors may be now, but it ought to be a start.

George Lasley

Thanks for all the help so far.

My current project is an old General Models Corp. (Later All-Nation) 40' steel-side boxcar kit in which the metal sides have been pre-painted/screened for Union Pacific.  The basic car color, according to the instructions, is "410M Tuscan Red".  Well, of course, 410M is lonnngggg gone.  Floquil continues to make a 'tuscan red' in their solvent paint line...bottles or rattle-cans...which I've ordered.  But, who knows if it's the same.  I tried some other colors that I already have on my paint rack...thought they might be close enough.  Not so. 

Yeah, I understand that mixing is an option.  I detest it, however, because I'm not methodical enough to keep precise track of what, and how much, and the subtleties each drop causes to put up with it.  And, sure as shootin', I won't have made enough the first time around, need more, can't remember, can't read my notes...if I even bothered to take some!......you get the picture, I'm sure.

I like the ideas above, however... 

Weathering: I'm not averse to the idea.

Post/save mixing results: Excellent idea!  There should be a forum site where this can be added to a master list as, for instance, the vendor sourcelist.  This would require, however, someone to take responsibility for updates as they were submitted/emailed.

There's a car kit I did a couple of years ago...Athearn metal sided 50' ATSF double door box in'express' color...a 'pullman-ish' green.  Again, the sides were pre-painted screened.  In this case, the box contained no kit-specific guideline on brand/color match.  I can't even recall what green I ended up using....it definitely was NOT a mix (see above!}, but even with applying an overall clearspray to give a uniform patina, the doors/roof/ends are not a very good match to the sides. 

Lots more kits to go.  I love building them.  I keep trying to improve on each one.  Color-matching has got me stymied, however.

Thanks, again, for the thoughts/help.

KD

I checked my 75 Years of Model Railroader DVD and in the early '70's, Linn Westcott wrote about color matching and how he did it.  Not complicated but definitely more of an effort than can be expected from most modelers in the internet era.

An interesting read...thanks for the topic. 

Matt

Years ago, All-Nation did do a color list showing which were Floquil and which were Scalecoat colors.

My personal technique is to gently squeeze/squirt 1 drop of paint (after shaking) onto a white comic backing board. The acrylic paints I use come in plastic bottles where a drop at a time will come out instead of a toothpaste-like mess. There all of the formulas I both created and learned from the G.I. Joe people are based on a 1-drop/2-drops/etc. basis.

I wish I knew a formula for matching Hemi or Hugger Orange (as used on the General Lee) or CSX's dark blue (specifically, the royal color they use on their boxcars).