I'm trying to repaint and decal several ACF 4650 Covered Hoppers in Union Pacific's light gray. Does anyone have any info on that specific gray? I don't believe it's the standard UP Harbor Mist... any insight? Thanks Andy
I would agree that it is not Harbor Mist. It seems like HM has a tint of blue in it which the freight cars do not. They seem more like a generic grey. On the Microscale conversion chart for Floquil Paint, they have a reference to ACFX hopper grey. The modern equivalent is Model Master 2077 Lichtgrau RLM63. However that is an enamel paint. I generally don't like Model Master's enamel paints, especially for airbrushing. They do have a few grey acrylics like Light Ghost Grey that would be close. Reefer Grey may be good too. Many paint companies have a color branded as such. What about just Primer Grey? I don't have an exact match, so I'm just trying to think of colors that may be close. Tru-color usually has pre-mixed railroad-correct paint, but they only have Union Pacific freight car red, not grey. Are you trying to match it to the factory-painted model? I think Atlas has the car in this scheme. If so, there is no guarantee that they even used the right color. If you already have some RTR models, match to them and not necessarily the correct Union Pacific color so your fleet is uniform. If you plan to weather them, any difference will be even less noticeable. You may want to pick a lighter grey to represent a bleached paint (if you plan on weathering).
Depends on the year, Covered hoppers were painted in UP Harbor Mist Gray until the mid 60's after that UP Covered Hopper Gray, both paints are available from Scalecoat in either the Original Version for brass and metal cars, or Scalecoat II for plastic cars. I use the Scalecoat II Up Covered Hopper Gray for most of my Covered Hoppers but alternate with Maint of Way Gray so they are not all shaded the same color. UP Covered Hopper Gray: MOW Gray Rick Jesionowski
