The Woodstock Train Show, and a Milwaukee Road boxcar weathered

I've spent time this week getting a number of items together to bring to the Woodstock Model Train Show at the fairgrounds in Woodstock,Ontario.  The show is tomorrow, October 21, and I've gotten myself a table there to try to sell a few things.

On the internet I found this photo, taken by Joe Pusey, of a boxcar that is somewhat similar to one I've had in my storage cupboard. The one difference that I notice is the greater number of waffles on the sides of the model. On the prototype, I particularly liked the dark rust areas on the doors.

Sooooo...using the photo above as an example, I weathered my ExactRail waffle sided high-cube boxcar over the course about 10 days or so.  It can take quite a while for the rust coloured paints that I use to dry, and I prefer to wait for that before before I move on to the next layer. This boxcar had a cameo appearance in this photo at the end of last week's blog.

This is actually the 2nd time that I've weathered this particular car.  I was never very happy with the way it turned out the first time, and got motivated to re-do it when I saw the photo that Joe had shared. I removed all of the previous weathering by use of Q-Tips dampened with 91% iso-propyl alcohol.  

I faded the too-bright yellow paint with ProtoPaint Flat Haze sprayed through my airbrush.  For the blackish areas on the doors and door tracks I mixed a bit of black into burnt umber oil paint and dabbed it on with a small brush.  The rust streaks are done with burnt sienna and burnt umber, thinned, and applied with a flat brush.  I patched over the original reporting marks with yellow trim film, but didn't change the number.  I also used some of the trim film on a few panels on one side of the car.

The yellow is still a little too bright I think, but I stopped applying the flat haze after about 6 layers because I didn't want the product to begin to turn the car white, or "frosty" looking.

I wanted to include the end of the waffle car here to show that I had patched the reporting mark there as well, so I snapped a quick picture.  But now I kind of wish I hadn't...oh well...I suppose the maintenance crew will be along shortly...and maybe the city street maintenance guys too.