Interurban Era

I'm so excited to show off a project 9(!) years in the making, the first SD45 painted in the Mexico68 paint scheme for my Alta California Railway.

I did that Tom Fawell inspired watercolor of the SD45 back in 2015 not long after I began working on the ALTA concept for the first time. Over the years a lot of refinement and changes were made to the railroad, its story, and the paint schemes.

The color scheme was directly inspired by the striking work done by a design firm for the Mexico olympics, the Magenta + Orange was used in some of the stadium decoration and wayfinding signage. Since the ALTA played a large part in transporting people and materials to the games, it was natural for the railroad to draw inspiration from it for the next generation of motive power on the railroad.

Now all that's left to do is final detailing, handrails and glass in the cab.

Modeler Arved Grass elaborates:

How to paint brass? Here's what works for me:

1. Disassemble model. Be sure any drivetrain parts (motor, gears, universals) are segregated away from the parts to be painted. Take lots of photos to document what goes where. Especially screws.
2. Grit blast. I've been using 270 grit Aluminum oxide in a Paasche LAC$3 in an old Harbor Freight grit blasting cabinet. Many have suggested I go to 400 grit.
3. Scrub clean with an old soft toothbrush and a good degreaser. Simple Green, Dawn Dish Soap... It really doesn't matter. Rinse.
4. Rinse in ultrasonic cleaner with distilled water.
5. Final rinse in 90% IPA. It will dry pretty fast. From now until the final coat of paint dries, model is handled with exam gloves.
6. Prime. I've been airbrushing Floquil Zinc Chromate primer. Since that's no longer available, I'm switching to SEM self etching primer. If you held a gun to my head and told me I had to use a "paint bomb," I'd use Tamiya primer.
7. I prefer Scalecoat paint on brass. Thankfully I have a stash. Rumor is it's no longer being produced. Get it while you can from dealers with stock (can't help you there - sorry).
8. Mask with Tamiya and Frog painter's tape. The two seem to be identical. Tamiya comes in small strips handy for edge masking, curves, etc. The Frog tape covers larger areas, or can be cut into smaller bits.
9. Scalecoat dries glossy, so no clear gloss is required before decaling, but a coat of gloss over the decals will help hide the edges. Do the gloss before your final coat of dull or semi-gloss. Reassemble model in reverse order of disassembly. Refer to the photos you took earlier. test drive to ensure everything is assembled and aligned correctly during assembly. Ditto coupler height. Isolate motor and add DCC/Sound/lighting as desired. during reassembly after mechanism is proven to work smoothly on DC. DCC will never fix a running issue. Now you know why the custom painters charge so much.

For years, I've been developing/refining the "look" and feel of Alta California railway equipment, and last night, I finally painted up this trio to match the original 1946 paint scheme (left) and the 1968 "Olympic" paint scheme (center, right).

The shells themselves are kinda wonky, older HO scale models that have just enough detail to fine tune the looks of the models without being "precious". The yellow & orange FA alone has ~8 layers of paint on it, and the others not much less. The replacement shells are inexpensive when I want to do the "final" version of each, but it's important to get it right before committing to the superdetailed models I've already completed and are sitting in primer.

Kitbash a PRR/ LIRR 4-6-0 to look like this surreal painting by Thomas Hart Benton's 1926 painting, "Going West" .