Box car red?

[Bill H]

Group:
While rummaging thru my paint stash, I ran across two totally unused Floquil Box Car Red rattle cans. As I had a large building to paint and limited Pollyscale BCR in a bottle, I was looking forward to using the rattle cans. I was eventually able to get the metal ball in the can to rattle and continued to shake the cans at length. Alas, after more shaking, more hot water baths, cleaning the nozzles, replacing the nozzles with known working nozzles, nothing. Rats.

So I decided to try to find a brush on BCR and thought how hard can that be, somebody must be filing in the gap left by PolyScale and ModelMaster departures for a rather important model railroad color.

To date - nothing. Even the MicroMark copies done by Vallejo, the BCR color seems not available on their website. Does anyone have a suggestion in an acrylic?

Kind regards,
Bill

[thomasjmdavis]

Bill,
If you are going to paint a building, why "boxcar" red?  The easy solution would be to pick up a rattle can of oxide red primer or "brick red" at the local paint, hardware or big box store.  Likewise, I am SURE Vallejo, Mission models, etc all make the color, it just goes by some other name, such as brick or oxide or, in the case of paints for gaming miniatures, it might be "dried blood red" or "rusty dwarven iron" (the local gaming shop carries a paint called "skeleton bone" that makes a pretty good concrete color).

On buildings, I've also had very good luck with the acrylic "craft paints" sold at Walmart and other stores with an arts and crafts section- in my local store there is a section for gloss and a section for flats.  Take a paint chip with you, or opt for "brick red" or "red oxide" and you will probably get pretty close.  It goes on pretty thick, but lots of colors available, and you could buy a pint for the cost of a couple 1/2 ounce bottles of "model railroad paint".

If you want "acrylic model railroad paint", the best option might be Rapido Proto Paint- it is great paint, covers well, also sprayable.  Downside is that as far as I can tell, there is only one dealer in the US who actually stocks it.  But the upside is you can find that dealer with a search for "Proto Paint" on eBay.  Now, to make things more confusing, Rapido makes 4 shades of boxcar red, that they label #1,2,3, and 4 with NO indication whatsoever (that I can find anywhere) which shade goes with what road.  The Rapido colors dry semi-gloss or gloss (so you can decal over them) and you may need a coat of clear flat over them when used to paint a building.

[GaryHinshaw]

Model Railroad Hobbyist posted a useful article about painting in the post-Floquil era, which included large table of color conversion recipes from Polly-Scale/Floquil to Model Masters, Vallejo, and Modelflex colors.

Most of the Vallejo recipes are for the airbrush-ready Model Air colors.  If you want to use the (excellent) brushable Model Color line, you'll have to go to the Vallejo site and look up the Model Air/Model Color equivalencies.  (I don't understand why they're not the same...)  Even better, just get a range of browns near the color you want and experiment with blending.  The Vallejo dropper bottles make that very easy to do, and the paint applies very nicely.

[randgust]

The other thing that works surprisingly well for buildings are the craft acrylics available in Michaels and others.   There are lots of earth tones, lighter tones, etc., the stuff is easy to work with, mix, dilute.   

I have been using them a lot for buildings because some of the 'brick reds' are really good.    You'd think they'd leave brush marks like crazy but that's not been my experience at all.  I started using them in scenery and decided 'oh, why not'... and first used them in my La Posada project as the faded turquoise and clay tile colors were spot-on in craft acrylics.   And for the most part, they dry dead flat.    I wouldn't use them for equipment paint, but for buildings, it's pretty impressive.

[Bill H]

Bill,
If you are going to paint a building, why "boxcar" red?  The easy solution would be to pick up a rattle can of oxide red primer or "brick red" at the local paint, hardware or big box store.  Likewise, I am SURE Vallejo, Mission models, etc all make the color, it just goes by some other name, such as brick or oxide or, in the case of paints for gaming miniatures, it might be "dried blood red" or "rusty dwarven iron" (the local gaming shop carries a paint called "skeleton bone" that makes a pretty good concrete color).

My apologies, I should have been clearer in my OP. The building already has one part done in PollyScale boxcar red and need to get the second part in a close match as they were built at the same time.

Kind regards,
Bill

[Bill H]

Model Railroad Hobbyist posted a useful article about painting in the post-Floquil era, which included large table of color conversion recipes from Polly-Scale/Floquil to Model Masters, Vallejo, and Modelflex colors.

Most of the Vallejo recipes are for the airbrush-ready Model Air colors.  If you want to use the (excellent) brushable Model Color line, you'll have to go to the Vallejo site and look up the Model Air/Model Color equivalencies.  (I don't understand why they're not the same...)  Even better, just get a range of browns near the color you want and experiment with blending.  The Vallejo dropper bottles make that very easy to do, and the paint applies very nicely.

Hi Gary:
I had that table and the conversion was for Model Master 4881. The only place I can find it is eBay and from Australia with a $66 shipping charge - which did not seem palatable to me. I don't need it THAT bad. It looks like I will have to go kicking and screaming into the Vallejo mixing options.

Thanks,
Bill

[GaryHinshaw]

I had the same trepidations, but I really like the Vallejo paints now.  Super easy to work with, once you have a color mix you like.

[nscalbitz]

Blending paints isn't that difficult in any type, once you know its 'medium';
and why do all RR (model) buildings have to be pristine and perfect?
They weren't made that way- at some point paint changes or was refreshed. Hell even do a 'being painted' scene on a showing wall...

There is a thread that tells you how to 'extract' paint from a pressure can somewhere as well,
regards d