Weathering freight cars without an airbrush
Rust spots from areas where paint has chipped off a steel carside can be simulat- ed by using a soft oxide brown pastel pen- cil to make a spot (above left), which is then smeared down the carside using a finger (above). A very sharp, white grease pencil can be used to make chalk marks on the side of a car (left).
Thankfully, india ink comes in many colors, and for freight car purposes, the various shades of brown seems to work better on steel cars, while the black (gray) works better on wood cars. I have several solutions of reds and browns, as well as the normal grays in several odd sized containers.
Store
these well away from any heat source for obvious reasons. I wash the entire carbody with a light coat of brown india ink and alco- hol, using a ¹/₂″ soft brush and broad quick strokes. Cover the entire car with little or no hesitation, with a nice even coat, and let it stand upright until dry. Drying time is only a few minutes as the 91 percent alcohol flashes off quickly. The “rust” pools naturally in the joints and corners, and makes for a very realistic effect acting much like rainwater would. While you are waiting for the drying process to finish, cut several little (¹/₁₆″ or so) scraps of white paper. The kit’s paper directions can work nicely for this. I make eight or ten cuts about 1″ deep and ¹/₁₆″ apart, then make the 90
74
degree cuts to make a whole bunch of little white paper “waybills.” Put them aside for now, as the alcohol is now dry and the car(s) are ready for the next step. We will return to these little scraps in a few minutes.
Now comes more rust powder on the brake wheel,
doors, and roofwalk.
Some black chalk dust along the roof of steam era cars will nicely replicate the
soot from dirty, old, steam locomotives. With the general weathering proce- dures for the whole body done, we can get down to the more specific weather- ing operations. When the carside gets smacked with a small projectile, be it a kicked up piece of ballast, or a thrown rock by a kid (kids never throw rocks at freight trains do they?), it will blast off a chip of paint. Combine the bare metal and a little rain and/or humidity, and there’s a nice rust spot. As that spot grows, continuing rain streaks the rust down the side of the car. I use a soft lead oxide brown pastel pencil to grind in a spot of rust, then streak it down with my most useful weathering tool–my thumb. Do this on two or three locations on the car, then clean your thumb so the “rust” only goes where we want it. You can also use the side of the pencil to rust specific parts of the car, like door tracks, and rows of rivets. I use several shades of pastel pencils for this.
To color the tackboards found on freight cars, the author takes a drop of gray and black paint and uses a brush to drag the two colors together (left). The resulting streaks of paint are then dry brushed on the tackboard (right) to provide the look of bare, weathered wood.
JULY 2013
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