In my projects to refurbish my Monotype pump and install a latch mechanism, I am now at the stage of needing to repaint some parts, and I am finding it to be a tricky job.
For one thing, In can’t rely on the colour on other parts of my caster because they aren’t clean enough to use as a standard. The dirt on them is sufficiently tenacious that any attempt to clean them would also remove some of the paint.
As a result I instead have to use some new (or like-new) parts from my parts stock, and in doing so I am finding that Monotype did not seem to be consistent in its colour choice. I selected one (unidentified) part which seemed to be the correct colour to match the rest of my caster, and I’m now trying to get a matching paint.
I only need a half-pint of paint, and paint stores are generally unable to tint such small quantities. Furthermore, this is a rust-preventing metal paint, for which tinting choices are limited.
I have started with gray paint as a base, and I felt that the actual paint colour was bluer and darker than the paint I had, so (in a small cup) I mixed up several shades with a bit of blue and/or black added. I thought I was close (and it was getting late) so I painted all but one of the parts. Upon finishing I looked at them and felt they were way too blue, so I will have to try again on a second coat.
I took photos of some of the colours I had mixed alongside the reference part, and the colour-picker in the photo editor is telling me that the target colour is lighter and oranger than my original gray, just the opposite of what I thought! I tried to take the photo in a manner to avoid the specular reflection from the gloss paint, but the gloss reflection may still be messing up my measurements.
Various colour paint samples are on the left, and the reference part are on the right.
This is the same photo blurred to allow reasonable measurement of the colours in the photo editor.
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