I need help weathering my track. I am going to use Railroad tie brown for the ties.
I can’t find that mid-western rail look. The rails have a rusty brown look to them.
I’m not sure what your question is? Are you looking for a better color than RR Tie brown or are you looking for pictures of track so you can chose your colors. A lot of folks use Roof Brown for a base coat and RR Tie brown for accents with some rust color and black for weathering. What line are you looking to model? I know CSX lines are a pretty dark brown color in most pics I’ve seen.
Kalmbach has a publication called Trackside Detailing (words in the title to that effect.) In which there is an article about track weathering using krylon spray paint to weather the track and i’ve found the technique works well.
There are three colors used, flat black, ruddy or red iron oxide primer, and light primer gray.
First spray the rails from the side with the ruddy or red iron oxide primer. (I’ve made a small modification to the article by holding card stock against the rail to prevent too much overspray) followed by the flat black sprayed horizontally above the rail painting the ties, then in random spots above the rail give it a light dusting of the primer gray here and there to highlight it. Be sure the area is well ventilated before you begin.
I don’t know what the rail looks like in your area but I’ll explain what I did to weather my rail. I went out and looked at rail in Connecticut and took some photos. Additionally, I looked at pictures in some of my railroad books and once I decided on the color I liked, I mixed up my own paint. I am using Delta Ceramcoat acrylic paint that is available in craft stores. The trick is to keep careful records of how many drops of each color went into the final mix. Obviously, once I got the color right in a small batch, I expanded the “recipe” to make a larger batch.
To get a “rusty” appearance after the paint is dry, I brush on some isopropyl alcohol with rust-colored chalk.
One thing I’ve discovered is that track looks different in different light and essentially you have to decide on the look you like and just go for it.
Hope this helps.
Mondo
Painting the rail a rust color does wonderful things for the look of track, including making the rail look smaller. Brush painting works well and you have less overspray. Wipe the rail heads clean while the paint is still wet so you get the shiny railhead/rusty rail look, and keep the paint out of the points of turnouts. I have used Roof Brown, Rust, and red Auto primer with success.
I have had pretty good luck using the floquil rail brown in the aerosol can…as long as you clean the railheads right after you apply it…it made the ties and rail pretty good looking and it was easy to accent any further details with some light chalk…and make sure to ventilate…the stuff is toxic