Hi Folks,

I've been a bit busy with work and a new layout project (more later) but finally found time to start transferring my bits and bobs from the old RMWeb. Here's a synopsis of my wagon weathering thread: original page on Old RMweb

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??? Originally posted on Sun Aug 23, 2009 4:13 am

I was inspired by Northern Maiden's thread (among others) to take the plunge and have a go at weathering a wagon. I've done a few buildings before with wash + drybrush, but never any rolling stock. I started with a Bachmann MTA (reasoning that since I have 4, it wouldn't matter too much if I made a botch of it) and this picture from Martyn Read's fabulous Fotopic site:

http://ukrailrolling.../p55847138.html

and three hours or so later, here's the result:

The little patch of paint in the photo is a lot more saturated, but I quite like the paler version. I also haven't managed to get the top angle of the bodysides the right colour, but I'll probably give that some more attention when I get around to making a load for it. The other side I'm a bit less happy with. I think it needs a bit more of the brown since the shading of the panel edges seems to be too strong. The touched up panel is to disguise a mistake - I was a bit aggressive wiping down one of the washes and took it back to the factory finish. I didn't fancy trying to re-weather one panel to match the others, so filled it in with the pink paint I used on the (prototypical) patch on the other side...

A big confidence boost was realising that lots of people don't use airbrushes for applying a uniform coat of underframe grime - I'd always imagined this would be necessary and I'm really glad it isn't. The materials I used were Tamiya acrylics, a couple of generic black + brown washes from Games Workshop, coloured pencils and MIG powders to tie it together. I have yet to apply a varnish coat, and would appreciate any advice people can offer - I have some Testor's Dullcote sprays (the old formula) but I'm not sure if they're compatible with the acrylics and powders.

If like me you were thinking about taking the weathering plunge, I'd say go for it - lots of fun to be had both browsing photos to choose a good example to work from, and in the actual doing. And unlike locos it's not too expensive to make a mistake