Painting wheelsets - what color do you use?


tomstockton

tomstockton

Tom Stockton
Gentlemen,

I am in the process of updating my rolling stock to metal wheelsets. In the process, I'm taking time to paint the wheelsets (and truck frames, and couplers, and underframes...). I've tried Flouqil Rail Brown (in a pen), Woodland Scenics Steel Rail (also in a pen), two or three shades of PollyS browns / red-browns -- and my current favorite, a Brown Iron Oxide, an acrylic craft paint I picked up at Hobby Lobby (don't recall the manufacturer off the top of my head). As a side note; I've found the paint pens the easiest to use; seems like with my often-shaky hands, the paintbrush wants to go everywhere, including places I don't want it to go, like the wheel treads or the fingers I'm using to hold the wheelset...

Actually, I like all the colors I've used, but I'm having a problem with the acrylic craft paint -- it seems to rub off easily, most noticably on the rims of the wheelsets, where the seem to occasionally touch the sideframes. And I've yet to find a comparable color in what seems to be available nowadays at my local hobby shop (Hobbytown USA -- Model Master, Tamiya, and Vallejo).

I would love to hear your insights / results / opinions / etc. on what color you use to paint wheelsets. Do you use different colors, or do you mainly stick with one or two? Have you had any luck with acrylics, like the craft paint at Hobby Lobby, Michaels, JoAnn's, etc.?

In advance -- thank you for your replies!

Regards,
Tom Stockton
 
I really never painted my wheels. I don't weather very heavily, but one of the last things that I do is to use an air brush and lightly spray a mud color along the bottom of the cars to try to simulate dust coming up as a train passes by and here's how it comes out.

IMAG0259.jpg IMAG0262.jpg IMAG0265.jpg IMAG0267.jpg

Guess I was just a bit lazy.
 
montanan said:
I really never painted my wheels. I don't weather very heavily, but one of the last things that I do is to use an air brush and lightly spray a mud color along the bottom of the cars to try to simulate dust coming up as a train passes by and here's how it comes out.

Guess I was just a bit lazy.
Click to expand...

HEY -- Lazy Works .. lol
 
I would use something like Burnt Umber, maybe Railroad Tie Brown, or something along those lines. The idea is that they should mostly be visible in profile, or the shiny tire should show, but little else except a hint of a shape.
 
If the paint is rubbing off, did you clean the wheels first? I used Grimy Black or Rail Brown.

Greg
 
I use Micro Lux grimy black and roof brown and may add rust if I'm going for an older appearance.
 
Chet: Great photos of your rolling stock. The weathering on the caboose is superb!!!

In retrospect on wheel set coloring (weathering), I was parked next to the UP tracks near Butler, Wisconsin when a unit train of covered hoppers slowly rolled into the UP Butler Yard. I was within 10 feet of the rolling stock and saw first hand a variety of wheel set coloring as the cars rolled past me. The color ranged from a dusty light color to grimy black. In fact, several cars had different weathered wheels on the trucks, indicating that perhaps the trucks had seen some wheel change outs.

Greg
 
Greg - Thanks for the comment on the weathering. I had both of them in Livingston last week when I was running at the club and got a lot of comments. I will probably be going over again this Saturday, but will be running my DC locomotives and will be able to pull a longer train and I will bring a lot of rolling stock, all weathered.
 
Since all the examples of real wheels that I have seen, both in real-life and in photos run the gamut of colours from rered rust to black as night...I mix it up..even on the same truck. I use whatever paint brand is closest to my hand, usually one or more of the Vallejo acrylics or some Walmart acrylics...very often mixed in with some weathering powders if I'm feeling really ambitous.
 
In the past, I've used grimy black on the trucks, but have pretty much left the wheel sets alone.
 
Gentlemen,

First off -- thank you for all of the replies! It seems like there is no "standard color" to paint wheelsets, as long as you do so using a weathering-type color. I know the prototypical wheelsets are unpainted to help railroad workers more easily detect cracks and deterioration, and repair / replace potentially hazardous wheelsets before they cause an accident.

I'm using a mix of Kadee and Intermountain wheelsets to replace the plastic ones that come with the kits. I could probably get away with not painting the Kadees, since they are already plated black. But the Intermountains are a shiny "chrome" color -- which looks terrific on wheel treads but toy-like anywhere else, especially on the outside wheel faces. Hence, the painting...

As for the trucks -- in the past, I've often assembled the kits with out-of-the-box black unpainted trucks. But since I'm taking the time to upgrade to metal wheelsets (painted), I'm painting the "shiny" plastic trucks as well -- even if that painting is just an light coating of flat black paint, which hides the shine quite nicely. Lately, I've been using a Rustoleum "rattle can" of satin-finish Dark Brown, which later get a spray of Dullcote to leave a matte finish.

All of the above will be improved upon when I get around to weathering, adding more rust, dirt, grime, mud, etc. colors. I just have yet to find a weathering method that I'm completely happy with. But as they say, "that's another story"...

Regards,
Tom
 
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