Been a while since I posted here but here goes.
I’m building Accurate Minatures B-25 C/D “Dirty Dora” and the ADF housing is marked to be zinc chromate/yellow. Well, this is a color I don’t have and I can’t see myself going out to buy a bottle for such a little bit of paint. Is there a formula to mix up this color? Hopefully I’ll have the colors needed.
Thanks for any and all help.
NEW MEX
Model Master has Yellow Zinc Chromate. I don’t think it’s a waste to buy a bottle of it. You’ll never know when you’ll need it again.
I believe that’s MM yellow zinc chromate in the inner flaps and dive brakes on this Voodoo:
If you have some zinc chromate green (interior green) available then you should be able to add some yellow to it to come close.
I guess the question is - what colours do you have?
If you have Tamiya acrylics, you can cobble something close using their Yellow XF-3 and Green X-5.
I don’t know the ratios, but i’d start at 3:1 yellow to green. I know to make interior green (Zinc Chromate Green) Tamiya give you ratios of 3:2 yellow to green, so i’d just do more yellow for yours.
Or split the difference and use XF-4 Yellow Green [:)]
Hello!
Please google “Zinc chromate” to take a look at the real thing. It’s actually a name of a corrosion inhibitor, and not of a definite color, so you have a lot of freedom here. Mixing some toned down yellow with a bit of silver should do the trick, but I don’t think you should add any green.
That thing with green comes from the fact that zinc chromate degrades when exposed to direct sunlight over time. To prevent this it was prescribed to add black paint to zinc chromate. The resulting mix is green in colour and is used in areas that can be exposed to sunlight, such as cockpits.
I hope it helps, good luck with your builds and have a nice day
Paweł
that’s cool! i never know that. Thanks for letting us know that Paweł. That’s the cool kind of stuff that you can only get here.
Pawel is right. There is a link someone posted here somewhere regarding Zinc Chromate and its hisory. There’s even salmon zinc chromate too. Somebody did a F-4U Corsair with Salmon Zinc Chromate.
Come to find out, it was I that found the link of zinc chromate and its history. Here it is:
http://www.colorserver.net/history/history-zinc-chromate.htm
Another good one from a fellow member here:
http://www.ipmsstockholm.org/magazine/2004/01/stuff_eng_interior_colours_us.htm
Thanks all for the info. I’ve got the colors mentioned here so I’ll experiment and see what I come up with. I only build an aircraft kit about every two years so (I’m a treadhead), and being retired on disability it’s not really practical for me to spend the money for a color I’m not really going to use very much.
My understanding is that zinc chromate was a rare beast that was both a paint and a conversion coating (chemically reacts with the metal you are trying to protect). I believe a chromate is used in some of the plain chemical conversion coatings.
An interesting story. A number of years ago while working for McDonnell-Douglas, I was a member of the local EAA chapter, and working on a homebuilt. Someone in the Mac aircraft division recieving department there let us EAA guys know of a situation that had arisen. The recieving department rejected a large shipment of spray cans of zinc chromate primer (yes, even airframe manufacturers use rattle cans occasionally). The only thing wrong with the stuff was that it did not meet Mac’s color standard! The whole shipment went to a local discount/salvage store. Many of us EAAers promptly took off and went to the store to buy lots of cans of that stuff!
Tried 6 drops of yellow with 2 drops of green zince chromate and one drop of thinner and got the color I was looking for.
Outstanding! Very glad to hear that you got the right color you wanted.[Y]
Hehe, cheers Phil - i’m so stuck in my ways, i don’t think i’ve even taken a close look at the what’s in between XF-3 and XF-5 [:$]. I think i’ll pick up some XF-4 next trip to the hobby shop.
[Y]