"Help Painting ACW Artillery" Topic

Hello guys,

Asking for some help. I am just getting into 15mm ACW and I am at the point of assembling and painting my miniatures. Of all the things I am having the most problems with, it is my artillery carriages/wheels, painting the tubes I understand.

1) What color do most folks paint the wheels & spokes?
2) How do you typically paint artillery carriages in general?

Thanks so much,
Joel Logan

i have most if not all of mine painted Olive Green. I do have several that are different shades of Brown. Most of the metal works on the guns were black. I think I have around 120 guns. Never used em all, prob never will….
VR
James Mattes

Thanks so much, I appreciate it. I missed there was earlier post on this topic. :-).

Joel Logan

James is correct. That is most Olive is the most common color.

Alot of confederates painted them gray but I always use olive. When someone ask why I always tell them that they are captured.

If you paint all olive the guns can be used for both sides.

Also early war confederate had some painted an orange color but I have yet to see any that color on the war gaming table.

Larry

James,
you should sell some of your excess ACW guns then. On Ebay, or get a flea market table at Fall In!

rick

Iron barrels were black; bronze barrels were gold.

James and Dan have fairly well covered it. I would suggest that as campaigning took it's toll the guns and limbers probably became a little less "tidy" paint wise. To go along with what Mr Beattie posts, I use gold metal paint for my bronze barrels, oddly enough I think it provides a better look on the table top.

When I first started painting my ACW material, I painted my barrels with Citadel bronze, which gave them a strange, reddish-gold color. A brighter gold – true gold – looks better from a distance, and seems (to my eye, at least) a little more faithful to polished bronze.

Model Master's "Bright Brass" (which IIRC only comes in a spritis based version) is fantastic for brass barrles. I have one jar of it just for that.

For my artillery I use a basecoat of flat black then bake it i the oven for 30 min at 200 degrees IIRC.

Then I mix a 20% wash of dark or medium green(model master) with turpentine and wash it liberaly and then bake again.

then I paint the black details.

I use testors brass for the barrel.

The washes give it a very deep effect.

I once knew a wargamer who painted all his ACW barrels a light green. After all, that's what they're like at the battlefield parks.

Hauptmann6, you're the only other person I've found who uses the baking technique. I've done that for years and never have paint wear off my miniatures.

I found a civil war era artillery manual where they give the formula for mixing carriage colours. They say it is exactly the same as for French Napoleonic carriages.

For my mirco armor I use www3.telus.net/Ritterkrieg the technique that is on there. works VERY well.

I figured I would try it with the cannon. Came out well too.

I use water based pain for figures though. I only bake the primer.

See my post on the earlier thread.
Most gray/green/olive
some rebel mustard yellow or dark red.

Would Like to know where I can order 54mm Artillery models? Any suggestions? Looking for Quality Stuff as will be displaying them.
Thanks
HossMiester

"I found a civil war era artillery manual where they give the formula for mixing carriage colours. They say it is exactly the same as for French Napoleonic carriages."

If I remember right, the formula is something like 30 grammes yellow ochre to 2,500 grammes black. I've made this for my Napoleonics as well, and plan to use it on my ACW as well. No one here wants to make over 2 liters of this paint, so what I do I just put some black paint on my pallet and add small dabbs of yellow paint till I get the colour I want. You'll be surprised when it turns green!!

Sgt Ironsides,

I would make an educated (3 years of painting classes in college) guess you will not get the correct color in this manner.

1st, it would depend on the chemical composition of your paint vs the historic paint. Are you using the exact historical pigments? Different elements can be used to make yellow or black which have certain, slightly different color characteristics (blacks are notorious for running the gambit of base colors within them). I would assume the original is oil based. What is the oil and does it have a slight tint? Reenactors and art conservators always run into the same problems. For example, to add to the misery, I read once that renaissance painters actually ground glass dust into their pigments to make them glow.

2nd, as a miniature, the color should be a slightly lighter shade to appear scale correct (an optical illusion of size).

3rd, Your lighting. What you see in a museum environment vs outdoors (at various times of day) will not be the same as you see under incandescent or flourescent light which has it's own different tint. The "correct" appearing color on your table will be more yellow, blue and/or etc than real life.

ejnash

There's an old saying, if you don't think it can be done, don't tell the fellow that's doing it!

And by the way, I've been painting for about 40 years now, and the colour I got, was just like Humbrol's French Arty Green….

We're paint wargameing figures, not a Rembrandt.

That should of said "We're painting wargaming figures, not a Rembrandt."