SDERy Class 1 Car #135 ~ Tru-Colorization

Mahogany and Golden Yellow Paint for #135 

#135 went to the paint shop for some color:

Tru-Color brand paint is the paint of choice for this car:

TCP-256 Light Primer

TCP-069 Reefer Yellow

TCP- 082 Rich Oxide Brown

TCP-010 Black

TCP-730 Metallic Copper

TCP-288_Brass

Battleship Grey was tried for the roof but it was too dark. So I reverted to Light Primer which seems to be a ringer.

The front end prints of the car include a trolley controller! I painted the top of the controller Metallic Copper.  The Brass paint is used for the grab-handles next to the doors.

It has occurred to me that painting the car may be easier while it's still in its kit form.  This would simplify painting the interior, as well as installing window glass and gate screens.  If this car is a successful runner on my layout I will most likely build some more of these cars. I will give painting and detailing before assembly a try.

Color Theory

Photo: Just a car guy.

After their useful service life, three SDERy Class 1 cars were pushed together to make a "triple wide" house in El Cajon, California. A few years back these cars were "rescued" and one of them was cosmetically restored. But they painted the windows green. I don't think this is correct. 

Newspapers and magazines back in the day liked to write accounts of new streetcars. This article written for the Electric Railway Journal by H. M'Nutt, Superintendent of Motive Power San Diego Electric Railway describes the cars; "Selected cherry is used for all doors, sashes, moldings, etc, the surface being rubbed down and left with a dead finish".  

This leads me to believe that the window were painted green by the residence to help the cars feel more "homey". So I stuck to the Yellow and Brown scheme without the green.

Next comes the stripping and lettering.  Which include gold!  So this will be a new venture in decal making for me.

Yes sir!

Special decals!

Dandy

№ 9 ~ Straight Outta Paintshop

№ 9 Gets A Fresh Coat of Yellow and Brown Paint.

TruColor Reefer Yellow for the body color, Roof Brown for the trim, Foundation for the roof and trucks.

But first, the brass was cleaned and primered with TruColor Light Primer (to help the yellow show up).

After the interior and body were painted, I masked the whole thing except for the window frames and platform for the TruColor Roof Brown. 

Yikes! A lot of paint pulled off with the unmasking! Either: TruColor is a delicate paint, or I didn't wait long enough for the paint to cure (24 hours), or I should have sprayed a sealer coat on first. Anyway, touch ups required.

But, the whole reason for this exercise, what initiated this project in the first place, was to try out TruColor Reefer Yellow as SDERy Yellow. And you know, its pretty darn close if it doesn't actually nail it!

Yes Sir! Might of nailed it!

Dandy

#426 Project ~ The Infamous Golden Yellow Paint Scheme

Painting a San Diego 400 Class 5 car in its as-delivered Mission Yellow and Mahogany Brown Paint Scheme. 

Now that this car has been properly prepared for painting, lets, oh I don't know, paint it?

To make sure the delicate yellow paint shows up in its intended hue, the car is first painted with primer. I prefer good old fashioned Floquil paints applied with a good old fashioned Air Brush. These enamels require a day of drying between coats. So although the entire paint process is shown here all at once, at least a day elapsed between each color application.

Research I have done has shown that for cars built around the same time as these cars (1924), the favored interior color was a white of some sort. Most folks don't paint the interior of their models, but as time will tell, these cars will look so much better with a painted interior. Not to mention the protection the paint will provide against the deterioration of the brass. I chose Floquils Antique White as the interior color for #426.

After the interior paint has dried for a day, the windows, doors, bottom opening and any other orifice to the interior is masked off with ordinary masking tape.

Today's recipe for San Diego Electric Railway Mission Yellow is:

10 - 20 parts CNW Yellow

1 part Rock Island Maroon

It turns out that Floquil Rock Island Maroon is out of production of course. But another Tuscan Red color should work. I only chose Rock Island Maroon because its a gloss. The idea is this: CNW Yellow is the closest yellow available to the chrome yellow used on these cars. So by adding a Tuscan color, its reddish hue will push the yellow more towards orange without actually crossing the line into orangedom (These cars have been described as "Golden Yellow" but have never have been referred to as an orange of any sort). And its brownish qualities will "darken" the yellow a bit.

After the yellow has dried for at least a day, the entire body is masked off except for the doors. Today's recipe for Mahogany is:

1 part Roof Brown

1 part Tuscan Red

One thing I ended up regretting was not masking off the sliver of body showing between the doors and steps. This has proved troublesome to touch up afterwards. So next time!

Also, this color mix is a bit dark. Either it needs to have some white added, or the doors need to be lightened during the weathering process.

I have a theory about the roofs of these cars. I believe they were originally painted with a Tuscan Brown paint that oxidized over time. Later color photos reveal these cars roofs having achieved a rusty reddish brown. This reddish brown is the most common color used with modelers and restorers of San Diego cars. But I'm certain that when these cars were new, the roofs were more of a light chocolate brown. For this color I used:

1 part Roof Brown

1 part Southern Freight Car Brown

1 part CSX New Image Gold.

Details such as headlights, retrievers, trolley pole hold down hooks and towers, and bumper are brush painted Floquil Engine Black. The window frames are brush painted with the Mahogany mix. And there we have it! My latest, greatest shot at San Diego Electric Railways elusive Mission Yellow and Mahogany Brown paint scheme.

Next up is powering this model with Hollywood Foundry's new Diablo mechanism. Awesome stuffs so stay tuned! Yes sir! Awesome stuffs!

Dandy

Niles Project ~ Yellow and Brown Paint for #109

After its last paint job was deemed unacceptable, the Point Loma car was stripped of its paint and is now ready for a new paint job.

While the Pine-Sol did a splendid job removing the paint, it left gooey, sticky boogerballs behind that where a real pain to remove. Scrubbing the model with Dawn dish soap on an old toothbrush helped a lot, but in the process I managed to loose a hand rail. So a new one had to be fashioned with brass wire.

Repaired, Cleaned, Sterilized, and Ready for painting.

Primed (Floquil Primer)

Interior painted with my Mahogany mix. (50/50 mix of Floquil Roof Brown with So. Freight Car Brown)

Masked

Exterior Paint (10 parts Floquil Railbox Yellow with 1 part So. Freight Car Brown)

Masked for Roof paint (Floquil Mud).

Detail painting (window sashes and bumpers(?)) with my Mahogany mix.


The Point Loma car is on the bottom. Compare this photo with the above photo and you can see that the new color is much more reasonable. Now it is the SD&SE car (center) that looks too yellow! Also compare with the photo of the original paint and I think I've pretty much nailed SDERy Yellow. Yes sir! Pretty much nailed it!

Dandy

Niles Project ~ Continuing Quest for Golden Yellow

Knowing the color is one thing. Replicating the color, that's another thing!

Splitting hairs at this point. The color slide of the SDERy work truck reveals a more brownish yellow. So I'm experimenting with mixing Floquils Southern Freight Car Brown with Railbox Yellow and CNW Yellow. The mix on the lower left (above) really caught my eye. Lets try that.

Hmm! Might be too yellow. At top is the Birney painted with Scalecoat colors. Next is #105 combine in Floquils CSX New Image Gold. Third is #107 sporting a 50/50 mix of New Image Gold and Railbox Yellow. But the Point Loma car on the bottom... It might be too yellow. Its a gorgeous shade of yellow though. But its more yellow than the Birney which is too yellow. But I tell ya... Its a very pleasing mustard yellow. But it needs to be a more of a golden yellow. You know... No matter how much I like it... its just the wrong color. Yeah, I don't think its quite right. Well... I really hate to do this, but...

... into the Pine Sol it goes. Its heart breaking. Such a beautiful paint job. But its just the wrong color, no doubt about it. Its gotta go. Damn. A lot of work down the drain. No wonder it takes me forever to accomplish something. Yes sir, It's no wonder.

Dandy

SDERy Yellow Caught on Color Film!

For the first time ever, I have come across the infamous yellow in a color photograph.

The San Diego Electric Railway streetcars wore their golden yellow and mahogany paint scheme from the companies inception (1892) to about 1931. Kodachrome wouldn't come out on the market until 1936. So as a result, nothing exists in the way of color photographs of the old paint scheme.

While looking around on eBay I came across this photo of SDERy 408 in the experimental orange paint scheme SDERy was trying out in the 1940s. I almost dismissed the photograph until I noticed that curved white line in the street. It warns of the overhang of the cars while making a turn. Ah, there is a turnout there. Going where? Oh hey, that's the car barn on the right. And whats that parked out front? The company truck!...

...still painted in the original company colors! There it is folks! Photographic evidence of SDERy "Mission Yellow" and "Mahogany Brown". Oh I'm so going to nail this color. Yes sir! Nail it!

Dandy

Niles Project ~ Primed and Ready

Getting ready for a nice coat of SDERy "Mission Yellow". Whatever color that is!

All right. With the Birney project once again wrapping up, I can now turn my attention back to the Niles cars. Here is where I'm at with that:

The new Sightseeing Car (far right) is awaiting its "De-PEing" while the other three have gotten a nice coat of primer. This time I'm using Floquil paint since I have come across a recipe for SDERy "Mission Yellow" utilizing that brand.

 On combine #105 though, I wanted to try out Floquil F110358 CSX New Image Gold. On paint swatches and in the bottle, it looks really close to being the right color for SDERy Mission Yellow. But on the car it looks very desaturated. And there is no way of saturating paint. You can desaturate paint by adding gray, but you just can't re-saturate a color. For the roof and under body details I'm trying out F110081 Earth. It looks good on the roof, even better when it gets weathered, but for the underbody details I might try Mud instead. The trim is painted in Roof Brown, but that's entirely too dark. I'm going to have to try mixing it with one of the Tuscan colors.

As you can see in this photo, SD&SE #101 has had a hard life. It started out as a passenger car, converted to an interurban, then involved in an accident and so rebuilt into a combine. I want to try to capture this flavor with my model of #105. So I just might leave it the faded color it is and just weather the heck out of it. Yes sir! Just weather the heck out of it!

~Dandy

Birney Project ~ Stickin' On the Stickers

Now that the Decals are made, it's time to stick 'em on.

Before anything else, seal the decals with a spray coat so the ink won't smear in the application process. Folks use clear Krylon, Dullcote, etc. Since the Birney is painted with Scalecoat paint, I sealed the decals by spraying them with Scalecoat Gloss. Let dry 24 hours.

It has been a while since I applied decals to a model, let alone decals with pin striping and that need such precision placement as these do. So, to gain some confidence I'm going take some decals that didn't print out all that well when I was trying out different settings on my printer, and use them to practice with.

Shown above is my handy "big ol' hunk of iron" that comes in very handy as a weight for various things. As you can see, I even used it to try out my SDERy Mission Yellow recipe on before I applied it to the model. Now its a perfect candidate to try the decals on! I'm using Microscales Micro Set and Micro Sol to help with the application proccess. Micro Set helps set the decals in place and Micro Sol softens the decals so that they will conform to irregular surfaces such as brick detail, plank detail, or in my case... rivets. The bottom decal was applied first. I was very pleased with it until I discovered that while smoothing it out, I had also stretched it to about 125% of its original size! Thinking I'm not supposed to smooth it out, I applied the second (top) decal and just let it dry on its own, thinking it will just tighten up and lay flat. But no, even though it didn't stretch as bad, its all wiggly. So I sent a frantic email to my good friend and fantastic modeler, Don Ball. He told me his technique for applying decals, which I followed very carefully. Turns out, I was not only using too much Set and Sol, I was using WAY TOO MUCH Set and Sol.

Following Don's instructions, I first dipped the decal into clean drinking water and set it aside to let the moisture from it loosen the decal. While that was happening, I took a much smaller brush this time and applied just enough Micro Sol to moisten the surface of the area of the car to be decaled. The decal was then slid off its backing right on to the moist, slippery surface. I used the brush sparingly dipped in Micro Set again to help position and smooth out the decal., using a small piece of tissue to blot up any excess. Once the decal is in place, I let it dry completely!

Now that everything is dry and stuck in place but good, now I can apply the Micro Sol (the hot stuff, that's why the bottle is red). But only to where its needed! In my case, right over the rivets. I applied small amounts over the rivets and let it soften things a little, using the brush to help conform the decal around the rivets. Not too much though, don't want to rip the decal. Let it dry!

Keep repeating: Moisten with Micro Sol only where needed, nudge, and let dry, as many times nessessary until desired results are achieved. When everything is in place and perfectly dry, I seal the decals by spraying the car with gloss coat.

For the dash signs, I cut some shim brass to size. I wanted to use styrene, but it don't come that thin. I painted the sign the trim brown color. After it was dry, I applied the decals to it and sealed them with gloss. Later I will glue it to the front of the car, after the weathering is done.

It's always amazing to me what a difference lettering and striping makes to a model. I think its looking sharp in its new pin striped suit. Yessir! Lookin' real sharp in it's new pinstriped suit!

Dandy

SDERy "Mission Yellow"

Put on your pajamas. Brew yourself a pot of coffee. Make yourself really comfortable, and get ready for a real snooze fest monologue! For I present to you-

Dan D. Sparks thoughts on San Diego Electric Railway Mission Yellow!

When I was in my young 20s devouring historical photos, I remember a conversation in which it was suggested that black and white photos actually contain color information, we just need to figure out a way to extract that information. Now here we are over twenty years later and that technology seems not to have materialized. So here I am once again agonizing over historical photos trying to determine what color San Diego Electric Railway yellow is exactly. The 100+ years old black and white photos offering little clues. But, clues do exist.

Clues come in different forms. I know that they were yellow from early written accounts describing the new trolleys as being a “golden yellow”. Though I suspect some embellishment with the “golden” part, the delighted reporter’s feelings creeping into his story. But then again, maybe they were golden yellow. I also have come across the description “mission yellow”, but there were no standards then, as now, for naming colors. Paint manufacturers can pretty much name their colors whatever they want. And what one manufacturer calls golden yellow can differ from another manufacturer’s golden yellow. I’ve seen pictures of a Union Pacific streamliner where every car was a different shade of “armor yellow”!

Car 54, there you are!

Clues that can be gleaned from b&w photos are the tone of the color. In this photo of car 54, I’m willing to bet that the ladies blouses are pretty darn close to “virginal white”… white, white. I’m also willing to bet that Kodak was using its familiar Kodak yellow color for its advertisements as seen on the right side of the photo. So I know that car 54 is not white, and it’s not bright Kodak yellow. This photo seems to support the “golden yellow” description, a little darker yellow. We also have to consider fading. Bright colors were more difficult to achieve and maintain back then, they would fade fast, especially in the California sun, thus lightening the tone. But! These trolleys were work horses traversing these dirt streets day in and day out, day after day, rain or hot, dusty shine. So they were getting pretty dirty, thus darkening the tone! So in essence, they were getting grayer.

As a reminder to not over think it, check out this tonal range of yellow! From very dark, to medium, to practically white! I suspect SDERy Co., like any other company, wasn't overly consistent with their company colors.

And then there are the tinted postcards. The thing to remember about tinted postcards is that they were tinted by hand, by memory, in the studio, not on location. And, they used whatever bottle of yellow tint on hand, no attempt to match the color exactly in the interest of time and because well... nobody cares or would even notice if it didn't match exactly. These two tinted photos of SDERy double-decker car #1 (taken at two different locations but almost exactly the same angle) depict two different tints of yellow! Did one studio take more care in matching the color? And if so, which one?! So frustrating!

Another thing to remember about tinted postcards is that they too are subjected to fading and getting grimy with handling over time. So they too are getting greyer. Oh! And not to mention generational copies! These postcards are not only getting greyer, but then were scanned by I don’t know how good of a scanner or camera, in I don’t know what kind of lighting conditions (incandescent lights make things appear more yellow, while florescent lights push things more towards the green end of the spectrum, etc…), and then subjected to whatever sort of enhancement with Photoshop type of programs, and saved with I don’t know what kind of settings, and then finally ending up on your screen which looks different from my screen! ssSSOOoo frustrating!!

The ultimate is to find an actual paint manufacturer paint chip. While very rare, I have known it to happen (Last year with Tiffany refrigerator cars “moss green”.). But, unfortunately, not with the San Diego Electric Railway.

The next best thing is a well preserved car from the era. A San Diego antique dealer rescued three vintage SDERy class 1 cars from a home and made efforts to protect them. Though not well preserved, these cars are yellow. But did the home owner paint them that color? Hopefully the cars were protected from the elements and the yellow is genuine. I haven’t been able to determine which.

Car 54! Your still here!

I visited briefly SDERy 54 at the museum at Balboa Park, but no one there could give me any answers on the authenticity of the color they used. To me, the semi restored car 54 lacks the elegant color schemes that were typical of its era. But that might just be because they painted the whole thing yellow, where as I suspect that the trim and seats were originally the natural color of Mahogany. Very much similar to this authentically restored San Fransisco streetcar:

Now this is an elegant paint scheme! The chrome yellow with brown lettering and red numbers with a dark drop shadow on them. And the natural mahogany seats, nice. I bet this comes real close to what the old San Diego cars looked like.

Another surviving San Diego car is this car now at the Orange Empire Railway Museum in Perris CA. I have never visited this car, so a trip to the OERM would be prudent. But a few factors worry me about the authenticity of the yellow on this car. It was originally a Salt Lake car that was brought in, like many other cars from around the country, to help out with the war effort in San Diego. Is that SDERy yellow on the front? Or is that a remnant from its Salt Lake days? Or did someone else put that on there? And if it is SDERy yellow, how much of the orangy color is rust showing through the yellow? How badly has it faded? F-r-u-s-t-r-a-t-i-n-g.

George Huckaby of the Southern California Traction Club is the only one I know of that has ever painted a model in SDERy yellow. I asked George about it and he was kind enough to email me his recipe that he and David Garcia came up with:

"Floquil UP Armour Yellow (110066) – 10 parts; UP Light Orange (110068) – 10 parts; engine Black (110010 ) 1 part; I make no guarantees as to correctness. This came about based on my own research and opinions of railroaders who I respect. I used this color on my car. See enclosed photo" (above).

Okay, so that’s it for evidence and clues that I have. Now it’s time to make an educated guess. I’ve taken some Scalecoat brand yellow paint chips and took a look to see what they look like in gray scale. After comparing the color chips with the color (and colored) photos, and the gray scaled chips with the b&w photos, I’m thinking that the Scalecoat S43 Erie Lackawanna yellow is looking to be just about right.

I’m pretty confident with my choice. But I might change my mind when I actually see it on my model. I’ll have to take a look and then determine any adjustments. Then I will be absolutely certain of my choice. The only way to change my mind and make further adjustments is if someone comes up to me with some actual paint chips and proves me wrong. Yessir! Prove me wrong!