Title kinda says it all - I need replacement US railroad colours for the old Polyscale line, in acrylics. I’m in the UK so will need to find sources here, so if you can recommend UK shops that stock the paints that’d be great!
(I’m starting to run out of my stash of old PS jars after all these years…)
Hi Tom,
Just found this post How do these escape me???
Polly Scale was, IMHO, the best acrylic available at the time (I haven’t tried them all I’m sure). If you could see me around my stock of Polly Scale, you would think you were watching Gollum with the Ring.
I really like LifeColor but they do not yet have US rail colors. (Do you like to mix your own?) I tried some Vallejo railroad colors and liked them but they are a simple weathering set.
If Badger still makes their ModelFlex, I’ve used it. Didn’t like as much as Polly Scale but at least they had railroad colors.
I won’t say I hate Testors for sending Polly Scale and Floquil to the scrap for their crap, but I won’t buy Model Master since they did so, not that I bought much after Polly Scale came out.
Now this is one of my tricks. I have begun using craft paints. Look up Jason Jensen Trains on YouTube, he uses them a great deal. I started fiddling with them almost 20 years ago and airbrushed Apple Barrel brass onto the radiator of a WWI German plane. Worked good.
Jason Jensen Trains - YouTube
Thanks Fred! I got used to PS paints because, well, they were good. And they had colours I could use for my LIRR stock. Best of all I could get them over here from places like Victors and Model Junction - sadly both now gone. I tried Modelflex but didn’t like it, especially for airbrushing. And I find Vallejo too “soft”, and prone to rubbing off with too much handling. If I have to mix my own, I guess it’ll have to be Tamiya acrylics, since they spray very well and are widely available here, but it means a ton of mixing and testing to get the colours right. I applaud your ability to not hate the folks at Testors - I can’t be as forgiving of them! Another case of big business having no care whatsoever about the products or the customers…
And I really miss my bottles of good old Grimy Black for adding crud to underframes…
They aren’t acrylic but have you tried Tru-Color? I really like them, solvent paints though they may be.
Not sure I can get them over here - I’ll have to look at their stockist list to see. (Being solvent-based I seriously doubt I could get them mailed…) Do they do a good range? And more important, how do they spray?
Tru-Color has a huge range of railroad colors, per some blowhard’s review,
Hosting over 353(!) colors in their model railroad range of solvent-based paints, and 135 colors for auto modelers…
They have added many colors since that was written.
They airbrush great if you mix them and use the recommended psi.
As far as airbrushing performance goes, I used them on some 1/144 wingy-thingies.
No attacking the styrene, no obscuring detail, nice glossy finish.
I found a place that still sells Polly Scale. I have a contact and tried to order any yet but they show a lot in stock
