John et al
Assuming that we are about the same age I'll consider myself, like you, a ways
yet from dotage.
In 1953 I was working in a gas station at Rock Port, MO...I was just past my
junior year in high school....One of the men who ran the "tank wagon" for the
distributor who owned the station was a "paint and body man"....
I had recently purchased a black 39 Chevrolet whose paint was in less than
pristine conditon.
The Rock Port Langdon and Northern rolling stock including ex CB&Q No. 440 and
1913 Baldwin 2-24-2T had been scrapped that spring. The 440 had most recently
been painted at the Q RH at St. Joe for the Burlington's 1940 90 year
celebration..My book 5 MILES OF FAMILY TIES as well as a Burlington Bulletin
chronicles the story.
In rummaging around in the still standing depot I came across a gallon can of
black paint..It had no label on it, but I assumed that it was "locomotive
black". Now thinking about it it was probably paint left over from the 1940
painting of the 440....although I didn't think about it then.
I had brought the can to my house for future use...The thought occurred to me
that maybe this paint would be suitable to repaint my 39 machine. I approached
the tank wagon guy and asked him if he would paint the car for me...He agreed
to do so and with only a little preparation the deed was done in the service
station service bay one summer afternoon. It took quite a bit of "thining" to
get the paint to the proper consistency to go through the sprayer, but when the
deed was done it looked pretty good to me.
After the paint had dried to a reasonable "dryness" I backed the thing out into
the sunshine...The painter remarked..."Boy..that's the blackest black I've ever
seen".. It reallly was black and quite "shiny"....It was indeed the blackest
of black and very "glossy"...
I didn't have the car too long after than since it developed some "inherent
internal problems and I unloaded it to a local used car dealer whose motto was..
"USED CARS THAT CAN BE USED".........but probably not for too long. He had
less than a sterling reputation as you might expect....
I wonder if perhaps my 1939 Chevrolet mi;ght be the only one ever painted with
"Official" CB&Q, locomotive black.
Pete
The car stayed around town awhile and retained it's blackness....probably
longer than it's internal components held out.
-----Original Message-----
From: cbqrr47 <cbqrr47@yahoo.com>
To: CBQ <CBQ@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Wed, Jan 19, 2011 9:11 pm
Subject: [CBQ] Paint Question
I'm just the right age. I'm old enouth to remember steam in regular service and
young enouth not to be an old man in his dotage! There is no "right" color for
Q steam engine roofs, fireboxes and smokeboxes. The graphite and linseed oil
and the red lead and linseed oil were locally mixed in the roundhouse. This
unlike the "locomotive black" enamel which was a commerical paint that came in
gallon cans and 55 gallon drums (it took 55 gallons to paint an M-4). Depending
on the skill of the painter a different colar could occur at the begining of
the job. With time, weather and dirty enviroment, the colors changed. I saw
smoke boxes and fire boxes from a light gray (almost white) to very dark gray
(almost black). Likewise cab roofs could be anything from almost pink to tuscan.
Btw, the painters belonged to the carmen's craft. Some of them could be on the
derrick crew. At Centralia, at one time the derrick engineer and the cook were
both painters.
So go ahead and experiment. Have fun you can't go wrong.
John Mitchell
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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