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Tinting or Coloring LEDs... and the meaning of life

In modeling, the goal is usually to create an end product with the highest degree of realism possible. To achieve this, often times, it's the subtle nuances that make the difference. The choice of colors and the degree of weathering, the placement and type of detail, the contrast between light and shadow. These are a few  of the things that can make the difference between a good model and a spectacular one.

It is our belief that with the micro-miniaturization of lighting sources like the LED products we provide, the impact that lighting can make in a modeled environment has moved from "putting lights on something", to being able to seriously impact the realistic effect that's trying to be achieved. Their miniature size and "cold" device temperature allows placement  in areas not previously permitted; their intensity, the ability to provide a major contrasting effect, and their virtual immortality allows for more complex designs but also simplifies construction techniques.

The right light, properly positioned, with the appropriate intensity and color, can really add life to any scene. Structures and passenger cars appear more "occupied", streets and highways more "active", industries at sidings "open for business", major industrial complexes (coal, wood, rock, power, fuel transfer, etc.) look "functioning". This illusion of activity (life) makes the visual experience much more interesting and allows you to draw the viewers attention to areas of your choosing and focus it on what you want them to see.

When planning a lighting project, many times the size of the light source is the initial guiding factor. For example, if you're designing a certain street light, you want your light source small enough to properly fit and not appear out-of-scale. Now, with the advent of our Nano Super-white LED, even the fabrication of scale street lights in Z-Scale are easily achievable. Using this product in larger scales such as N, HO, O and above, opens the door to endless possibilities. Our Micro Super-whites are about twice the size and provide about twice the light. Our 2x3 LED is about four times the size of the Micro and outputs even more light, in fact in many applications it will substitute in output for the common T1 (3mm round) LED at a fraction of its size.

Compared to our 2x3 and Micro Super-white LEDs, these Nano Super-whites tend to have a spectral output that is slightly shifted toward the blue-white. The good news is that because they are LEDs and virtually "cold" devices, color output can be easily adjusted by tinting with clear acrylic paints. The tinting material will not become  discolored or charred through the prolonged exposure to heat so commonly associated with incandescent devices. And, because they are "point" light sources (high intensity from a small area), this tinting does reduce the brightness of their output some, but not to any major extent.

General Tinting Guidelines

For LEDs of the white color family, the most common reason to adjust color is either to move a blue-white output toward a more pure white color or, a warmer incandescent "yellowish or golden-white" color.

In model railroading, if your modeling period is the transition era (steam to diesel) or earlier, much of the lighting in locomotives, passenger cars, and general street lighting, used incandescent bulbs which produced the more yellowish or golden-white light. The later part of the transition era (early 1960's) also introduced mercury-vapor and sodium-vapor lights, mostly in street lighting and industrial applications. These devices rapidly gained wide acceptance due to their very high-intensity output, long bulb life, and reduced operating cost due to higher electrical efficiency. The mercury-vapor lights have a slight blue-white spectral output, while the sodium-vapor produces an orange-white light. Today these mercury and sodium light sources are the most common and can be seen in nearly every neighborhood as streetlamps and security lights, along freeways, at airports, parking lots, and throughout industrial areas. Incandescent (filament) bulbs are now relegated almost exclusively to residential and rural settings. Quartz-halogen light sources are also common in commercial use today. Their spectral output is typically a fairly pure white light and very intense. For commercial and industrial building interior lighting, fluorescent tube lights have dominated for nearly 50 years. Operating costs are very low. Their color tends to be slight bluish-white. Railroad passenger car interiors have been using fluorescent lighting from the early diesel period.

In all of the above cases, light output ranges from slight bluish-white to orange-white. Our Super-white LEDs fulfill many of these lighting situations in their "stock" or untinted form. Our Super-incandescent 2x3 LED can produce very accurate incandescent appearing light, and our Super yellow-white LED, a very warm hue typical of earlier era lighting.  Our 2x3 Super-white and our Micro Super-white produce a very white light output, white our Nano Super-white has a slight bluish-white cast. If necessary, we can adjust color output easily using one single product. Tamiya acrylic Clear Orange paint, appropriately thinned, will produce the degree of tint necessary to replicate each of the above types of lighting. Tamiya Plastic Model Company which  manufactures many high-quality paints for modeling, has a series of clear acrylic paints. These can be thinned using water or their acrylic thinner which is alcohol based. If you choose water, we recommend using only distilled water for the lowest mineral content. Their thinner has the advantage of lower viscosity and it dries quicker than the water thinned mixture.

We recommend thinning the Tamiya Clear Orange by 60-80%, prior to application. Apply this thinned mixture to the LED lens (clear housing portion) after you've wired-up and tested the LED and prior to installing the LED into whatever you're fitting it to. The reason for such a high degree of thinning is so you can "sneak up" on the tint that you desire. If necessary, you can apply a second coat (or even a third) to achieve the exact color output you desire. However, if the thinning proportion is too low, it's difficult to go backward. Once you've experimented a little you'll be able to arrive at the amount of thinning and number of applications needed to give you the desired result.

If you're concerned about experimenting on an LED that you've just wired up, try painting a thin coat on a piece of clear acetate like the blister pack covers that package nearly everything now days, and shine your LED through it to check the spectral shift. You can make two or three dabs on the same clear material, the add a second or third coat. When dry, shine your LED alternately between them and pick the one you like best. When you're done, cut out this "test" sample, mark it, and file it away for future reference.

Special Coloring Situations

In addition to our Super-white products, we offer Micro and Nano LEDs in red, yellow, and green, and Micro in blue. These have quite pure colors with the yellow tending toward the amber shade of a traffic signal caution light. These LEDs work perfectly for either traffic or railroad block signals and many typical hazard or emergency lights.

In certain lighting situations you may find coloring a Super-white LED will provide a higher level of realism than using a standard red, yellow or green LED. Here are several examples, I'm sure you can come up with many more:

  •  An emergency or police vehicle with flashing bright blue lights (of Nano size).

  • Uniquely colored decorative lights associated with particular signage (hotel, bar, etc.).

  • Airport taxiway marker lights (blue).

  • Yellow lantern light (can be achieved using our Micro Super yellow-white LED)

  • Sodium-vapor (orangish-white light) Tint a Micro Super yellow-white LED with diluted Tamiya Clear Red

Try some of Tamiya's other clear acrylic colors. You can also mix them to make any color you need.      A brown colored light?  Well... maybe not.        Purple?

Here are Tamiya's part numbers:

  • X-23 Clear Blue

  • X-24 Clear Yellow

  • X-25 Clear Green

  • X-26 Clear Orange

  • X-27 Clear Red

  • X-20A Thinner

 

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