I appreciated all of the varying responses to my inquiry on matching prepainted
freight car models. Pat's article in Volume 3 of the RPC CYC was very helpful.
Incidently Pat also did an article in one of the old Model Railraoding magazines
which also addressed this issue.

I unfortuantely do not have an eye that can determine if a color needs a little more
red or orange to do a paint match. All of my rolling stock is weathered. I find it
best (for myself anyway) to begin the process with a car that has a good uniform
paint job. IMHO weathering should never be used to cover up flaws in the paint
or poor modeling.

Many of us now exchange the roofs on Intermountain models with Red Caboose roofs
because the RC roof is much more accurate. We also readily exchange doors in
order to better represent the railroad that we are modeling (The factory finished
models do not always come with the proper door for the proper railroad). It seems
better to have these additions match the original paint job as opposed to making up
a story about the revision being done after the car had been in service.

I have gotten many good paint mixes from people on this list. A Northern Pacific
color was achieved with a mix of Folquil Boxcar Red and Floquil D&H Caboose
Red (Who would have thought of D&H Caboose Red?). It looks really good on
the Central Valley stock car in my production line. Jeff English provided an
excellent mix for New York Central boxcars. I have used with great success
Greg Martins +Red and +Orange system of shading panels. I was just hoping
that someone might already have achieved a mix for the basic Intermountain
car.

Well I just have to make time to sit down and start mixing.

Thanks To All:

Bill Pardie