New Humbrol Wall Chart, 2018.

[Airframes]

Here's the latest paint lists from Humbrol, showing the range of enamel and acrylic paints in a wall chart format.
Some of the 'old' RLM colours have been re-introduced, last produced under the 'Authenticolour' title probably 30 years ago.
Note that some, such as RLM 70, are not yet in stock, but should be soon.

 

[Crimea_River]

Thanks Terry but you haven't been a good spokesman for Humbrols, surely.

 

[Wurger]

 

[Airframes]

You're right Andy, and I still have problems with some of their paints.
However, a couple of the more recent tins I've bought, such as No.65 (RLM 65) enamel. have been much better, smelled more like they used to, and performed well. That said, others in their range, particularly matt black, matt white, and some of the greens, can be troublesome, with the black, in particular, very soon going like tar !
They're nothing like the original paints, when they were actually produced by Humbrol at Hull, which were possibly the best, most consistent modelling paints ever made, but they seem to be improving - maybe yet another manufacturer has got the contract ?
Anyway, I've ordered a couple of tins each of RLM 71 and 02, to see what they're like when used on some of my BoB builds, but they'll have to go some to beat the quality and ease of use of the Model Master enamels !

 

[SuperFire]

After buying six tins of Humbrol paint, and using two of them, then reading up on them, my level of HATRED for this company is white-hot! NEVER AGAIN will I buy another of their totally, ridiculously inferior products. May they go out of business right now! I'm throwing away my other 4 tins.

Staying a Testors man. Their product actually works, right out of the bottle with no need to do anything but shake it up a little, and they even LABEL their paints; imagine that!

 

[Airframes]

Humbrol as a company ceased to exist over ten years ago, after one of the 'take overs' of Airfix, before Hornby Hobbies bought the Airfix brand, and the Humbrol name.
As I have mentioned elsewhere, Humbrol paints used to be the best bar none, when they were made by the Humber Oil Company at Hull, UK.
But since the demise of the company, and the loss of the factory, the paints have been made elsewhere, in various locations outside the UK from what I understand and, as you have found, the quality is nowhere near what it once was.

 

[SuperFire]

Rodger that Airframes. I have no idea my hobby shop steared me towards them. Good old fashioned American Testors kicks the crap out of Humbrol and is cheaper on top of it. If Humbrol was ever good paint, it was certainly long before I ever heard of them. As it stands their product is the worst I've ever come across hands-down. There is nothing positive to say about them, from the horrible container, to the lack of labeling, to the fact the paint is like clay with oil laying on top, to the fact that the paint itself does not adhear to the plastic nearly as well as Testors does. Humbrol is pure trash in every way.

 

[Airframes]

Well, Humbrol, as the Humber Oil Company, had been going since 1919, originally making paint for bicycles, and making model paints from the 1950s.
I've used them since about 1960 and, as I mentioned, they were the best in the World at one time, bar none.
But, since the various take-overs by various groups, including Borden, they were put out of business in 2006, and the paint, still under the Humbrol brand name, which was bought-up with the Airfix and other brands, is made elsewhere.
Some of it is OK, but it can be hit and miss, and many times I have been unhappy with the inconsistent 'quality'. That said, some recent paints seem to be much better, so it's possible that it is now made to a better standard, but only time will tell.
I'll admit, I do like Model Master paints, although some of their colours seem slightly 'off' in shade, compared to the 'real' colour, but not by much.
Oh, and I find that, unless Model Master paints are stirred really well, like any enamel, they will not adhere as quickly as they should, and take a lot longer to dry, if applied by brush, and must be thoroughly stirred before thinning for airbrush use.

 

[Crimea_River]

Hard to feel that passionate about model paint but FWIW, the old Humbrols were excellent paints when I used them to brush paint my models 40 years ago. I still have some tins of it and those "crappy" lids have done their job keeping the paint fresh for since then. Conversely, I've had my MM paints dry up after 2 years because the cheap paper seal in the lid sticks to the paint on the bottle rim and gets destroyed.

To each his own.

 

[SuperFire]

I keep seeing people say you must stir the paint. Shaking mixes up paint far better than stirring does. If you shake the paint well, then it's mixed up. Why would you also stir it when shaking is superior for mixing it up? Maybe I should caveat that by "shaking" I mean vigorously enough that your head is shaking with it and if you had a mouth full of marbles they'd be falling out of your face while you did it.

 

[Crimea_River]

Whatever.

 

[SuperFire]

When you go to a paint store, and buy paint for your house, they don't stirr it up. They put it in a shaker. Latex or Oil based; makes no difference. Shaking is better than stirring. It's stirring plus every other direction all at the same time.

 

[Wurger]

And do you use a such shaker like they have in the paint store? I don't think so.
They use the tool because if they have to shake 2kg cans of a paint manually they wouldn't be doing anything more on all day long. What is more the shaking could affect their digestive systems what would result in getting diarrhea. About muscles I don't mention at all.
As memo serves paints also had been stirred in paint mixers before shakers appeared. While I agree using of a shaker is more effective , the manual shaking isn't. Just you are not able to generate such vibrations using hands. I'm almost sure that many of us here shake cans or bottles of paints initially but then stirring colours cerfully. That is the best way for limiting or avoiding many problems with applying of paints.
Additionally .. in the past , also a filtration of paints before using was recommended. Today we can omit that because of better quality of colours. But stirring and shaking paints are still needed.

 

[SuperFire]

I worked at Sherwin-Williams in college. We shook paint for the best of them. Movie sets to suburban homes and industrial parks. All you have to do is shake it, and smoke a cigarette, and it's good to go! It's all a matter of scale. Testors comes in tiny bottles. 45 seconds is enough. I've decided to do a model using only super-glue, mud and things I find in the back of my pantry. I shall show the model industry that you can make a good model with basically garbage and that if they don't shape-up, we'll just stop buying their over-priced crapola. You mentioned modeling was an expensive hobby. It didn't used to be, and the fact that it is, is what drives younger people away from it. It's time to paint with shaken mud! CAN BE DONE! These are, after-all, really toys. They're plastic toys.

 

[Wurger]

They're plastic toys.

And now we came to the point. Most of modelers don't consider models the plastic toys. These can be joy, fun but after all , a piece of an art getting a piece of a modeler's soul. So no wonder people who spent a lot of time working on a model, treat them with respect but not as the plastic toys..

 

[SuperFire]

You can pay a professional sports player millions of dollars, but he's still playing a child's game. These are pre-fabricated kits Wurgur. The entire industry was focused at children when it started. You can do a real good job at it, but they are intrinsically toys. If you want to make art then you do it scratch-built in my opinion, not from a plastic model kit, but that's my viewpoint on it. I do models to relax and have fun. I learn a lot more about the planes which is also enjoyable to me. I want to do a good job and improve at doing them. But I have no illusions about this being art. If it was art I'd be doing the plastic molds or doing them out of other materials. This industry was geared toward children, but the children grew up. I'm making toys. It delights me to do so. Hopefully real nice ones.

 

[Wurger]

OK. That's your opinion. Copied that.
I think we should stop the discussion here. It seems to be endless.. Airframes can be angry of us becaus of kidnapping his thread. But it was nice to talk to you.

 

[SuperFire]

Ok! Just bantering back and forth to me.

 

[Wurger]

Yep.

 

[Lucky13]

Bacon!