Blog Archives
The Colour Red – or the Quest for LMS Crimson Lake
A topic that comes around from time to time, including to my lips, is what colour exactly is Crimson Lake? I thought that my analysis and that of others that have contributed to the discussions were worth sharing more widely; so here goes……….
The Historical Context
The first good insight I have is from George Dow who was a prolific author of the 1960s and 1970s, including on liveries who wrote in the Railway Modeller in 1973:
However authorative this is, fifty years later, with the change from natural to synthetic pigments this is not of great help. Also B&Q do not stock alizarin lake last time I looked as it is a pigment produced from a complicated processing of a vegetable and is probably fairly inconsistant anyway. https://www.winsornewton.com/row/articles/colours/spotlight-on-ruby-madder-alizarin/).
The Problem With Reds
Many years ago, when I was still in my shorts, I worked in a printing ink manufacturering business and red was one of our bugbears. This was for three reasons; as a colour it is less opaque than many colours so were prone to poor coverage, it is also prone to fading and like all paints, it is affected by the surface treatments, in our case varnishes. All of these issues affect how Crimson Lake appears on both the prototype and our models.
A Caledonian diagram 106 non-corridor composite shortly after being renumbered to 19952. This appears to have been acheived by painting over the predecessor number and then the application of the fresh number and then varnishing. The patches that have been so treated stare at you somewhat and ilustrate how the paint and lustre deteriorate! Photo by H.R. Norman ref 6081 and now in the NRM
Its still a problem now too as this diagram 2171 full brake at Kidderminister shows. Photo SVR Enthusiast via Flickr
Both of these coaches have been painted in the same top coat, Precision Paints LMS Crimson Lake. The top coach, the clerstorey, followed the paint sequence noted by George Dow above – a first undercoat of LMS wagon grey, followed in turn by 75% grey, 25% crimson; 50% each; 25% grey, 75% crimson and finally 100% crimson. On the lower coach, the crimson was neat and painted over an undercoat of LNER bauxite. Both were painted at the same time, in otherwise the same manner and in both cases they were varnished but not weathered. The difference is startling! Photo and models by John Hastings Thompson.
Does Colour Scale
Like weight, I am not convinced that colour scales or perhaps it does but given that our models are smaller than the prototype it is more heavily heavily by contrast. I am sure we all know about the optical illusion causing the viewer to read differnt colours of the same sample by virtue of the background – is this happening to us as we perceive the colour of a model? Try the sampel from the Exploratoium below:
The presence of lining is also a major influence of the feel of the colour. The gold and black of the LMS seems to add a bit of sparkle and depth of colour to the red.
It was a Long Time Ago
We must also remember that the last LMS crimson lake locomotive or coach will have been repainted seventy years ago and even the last BR maroon loco was withdrawn sixty years ago (plus there is the argument as to whether they realy were the same colour as well!). Whose memory of colour is good enough to survive this long? Even photographs from this era as a whole cannot be relied upon due to the variability of colour rendition, the nature of the light that the subject was recorded in or the level of contrast with its surrounding – none of these issues have gone away with modern digital photographs!
I for one have never seen either original colour and my view of what crimson lake is being based on the preserved locomotives that I have seen over my life. Have the preservationist got it right? Maybe they are better informed than you or but if this was true, why is there so much variation in the colour from the ready to run manufacturers or even the paint manufactuers?
However, whether they are right or not, the preservation scene has set my expectation of what the right colour is and I suspect the same would be true for all of us. Whilst I hate making modelling decisions on any history which is not real, I have reached the conclusion that the right colour for me is one that matches what I have seen in the UK preservation scene.
Where does this leave us?
Possibly the first conclusion is that there are a wide variety of reds that we can safely consider to be correct for Crimson Lake – phew, because when I look at my models I do have variences!
The second conclusion is not only is some inconsistancy acceptable, it is actually essential because red faded so noticeably. I am less convinced that the changing of hues seen across some colours but a toning down of the colour and tinging to a more matt colour is definitely prototypical.
In my personal quest for a colour I have been through multiple agonies to get the right colour. Thirty years ago, it was Precision Paints Crimson Lake but this seemed (to me anyway) change and become too purple over time. I then used Rover Damesk Red from a rattle can but found this too uncontrolable or, if I held it further from the model prone to to giving the orange peel effect. I was then put on to the solution to all our colour problems by Jim Smellie (of Caley Coaches).
This suggestion was to use the colour that the preservation industry generally use to source paint for the 12 inch to the foot models. This comes from Craftsmaster paint who have a series of specialist railway colours for most of the colours that we will wish to use. I use a numberof their colours including Crimson Lake. I have yet to adulterate this but i do intend to let it down with some white to imitate fading – hopefully this will not send me down another quest for the right faded Crimson Lake!
More Weathering Results
The class 24 skinhead was not the only output from the weathering day last weekend – indeed, it was a very busy day!
First up were some of my 1920’s rilling stock – both Highland, a timber truck from a Model Wagon Co whitemetal kit and a horsebox from a Lochgorm etched kit. Both are now close to finished – a load is requird for the former and some glass for the latter (and probably a light colour inside the groom’s compartment.
Neat vehicles though and I am pleased with them – less so than the brakevans that I managed to dislodge the lettering upon and may well need to be stripped – as you would imagine, no photos of these and nor any photo’s from today’s efforts with paintstripper!
But the main additional output was some more coaches for Portchullin. I managed three and Peter Bond looked close to finishing his third as I left, so we had a proper little production line going!
The technique was essentially the same as I described for the class 24, although as you can see the model was broken down rather more (in part to populate the interior of the carriages – I do hate seeing trainloads of empty coaches on model railways!). However, for the maroon coach, rather than using thinners to take back off the paint, T-Cut was used. This is an abrasive so does not work in quite the same manner but acheives broadly the same effect except that it also polishes the paint. I did not think this was right for the blue/grey coaches (they were finished in satin in reality) but the maroon coaches were in a gloss finish and the T-cut gives a slight sheen without actually getting to gloss. I did eventually think it was a bit too shiny, so did waft over with the finest of sprays of the “gunk” again just to take it back a touch.
The Bachmann Mk 1s are very good models that have stood the test of time well. They are a doddle to convert to P4; taking maybe 60-80 minutes a go. There are a couple of things to look out for – firstly is that the side frames are a touch to tight for true guage wheels and need to be filed back. The plastic is quite flexible and does create burrs fairly easily, so once the filing has been done some work with a sharp scalpel is required to clean this up.
The next caution is that the bogie mounts are not always parallel with the rail head, meaning that the bogie can lean forward or backward. This is caused by the chassis being screwd a little over-hard onto the body, causing it to flex slightly. You are just as likely to have done this as the manufacturers and I get around it by making it rock slightly with some thin (20 thou) strip like this.
Arguably one of their weaknesses is the corridor connection which is a tad toy-train (well it is a toy train!). A dodge that I have started to do is fit a few of my vehicles with some black foam in the door jambs. Make this so that it sticks out 3-4mm and engages in the equivilent of the adjacent vehicle to block out the light. A simple dodge that makes a big difference. It does mean that the vehicles that are fitted thus have to be in the centre of the train (as the foam looks crude where it is exposed) but this can be done with care – for example a buffet would nearly always be in the centre of a train, so this is the vehicle of the two I fitted with this.
highland miscellany 