Making tankers...can you offer ideas

[Gil Finn]

I bought a half dozen used tankers Friday and have been all of them repainting black and replacing some couplers. They were mostle cheaper ones with Texaco or Gulf's logo.
I also got an oill storage shed I disasembled and kit bashed like wise with some new colors. Irepainted the tanks bright silver and the ruff siver with rust.

I have a tanker filling station kit yet to asembel.

My black tankers are flat back and look to black!!

I amd going to letter them with dry transfers and that might help.

I have some Carbide on the way from ebay also.

For years at the plant in south charleston they fill up tank cars and I want a momento of those days on my pike.

I would like to see the tankers you have on your pike for some ideas. Please post or direct me pages of such.

Gil

 

[Gil Finn]

The sun on a cold day thru the glls fries items weel and I can always turn up the furnace a bit to get a warn current of air here.

As long as the wife has a few hours yet at work I get a long OK...I can air out the house.

The kit is a corner stone fueling staion. I may get a second and make one large one but means a bigger foot ptint and I am way over on accessories and short on table as it is.

Gee, I just love kits and repaints. I may never build a layout, just kits and cars.

 

[MasonJar]

Gil,

From what I can see, those tankers look great. I know what you are saying about the black being "too black"... Have you tried weathering with a bit of white or grey chalk? How about drybrushing some dirt on the wheels and trucks, or adding some rust to the underside or ends? And there's always some spill over the side of the tanker - maybe a bit of oily/glossy black to suggest a bit of spillage?

Andrew

 

[joesho]

i have some

i only have 2 tank cars

 

[Russ Bellinis]

You might try some weathered black which is more grey, or spray a white wash mixed at about 10:1 paint to thinner over the tanks to lighten the color a bit.

 

[jambo101]

A few smears of gloss black around the filler might give a wet look.

 

[Gil Finn]

All good ideas, thanks I will try each.

 

[jr switch]

Gil, something that I have had good luck with; I have usually hand painted steam engines and the black tankers with the testers flat black, diluted about 3 parts thinner to 1 flat black, spread evenly over entire car. Let it dry, maybe half an hour , then lightly rub upper areas and sides with small piece of soft cloth and very lightly with soft "Q" tips. The rubbing knocks down the roughness of the flat surface and looks just like old, slightly worn black paint. The dusky looking flat areas are left behind grab rails, along the bottom, along rivet lines, edges of hatches and so forth.
I used a light grey, slightly diluted with thinner, around the tanker filler hatch covers in a random pattern, then kept lightly scrubbing with a paint brush and a tiny bit of thinner until the grey was very light and looked like the stains I see on the tankers out at the Andersons plant.
Don't know if the flat black will work the same if it is sprayed on, might be too thick of a coat. Try it and see I guess------------ John R

 

[Glen Haasdyk]

I've found a Flat black spray in wal-mart that I use on my engines and other black projects. It's real cheap brand called 'Color Place' I think I only paid 1.29 for a can. It seems to have a slight grey in it's pigment since it comes out sort of a charcol black. I find it doesn't hide the detail like other blacks. After spraying with it and letting it cure (a couple days) I spary with dulcote or another clear flat laquer. This seals the paint so your figure prints don't show up so much on it when they are handled.

My one tank car (an old Athearn three dome) Is weathered using Poly-scale oily black sparingly around the dome caps to represent some spillage. I leave it shiney black closer to the domes and add some black chalk father away to represent older spills that have picked up dust and dirt.