The Mix-Once Color Match Kit

The DieCastVault kit for matching a touch-up color by ratio, mixing the whole job in one batch, and writing it down so it mixes again

DieCastVault's Paint Mix Ratio Calculator splits a color ratio into mL and drops, and its Weathering Wash Ratio Calculator splits paint and thinner. On the site they never meet, both count 20 drops to the mL whatever the paint, and neither says how much of a color to mix or how to mix it again. A faded red matched at 7:2 on a test chip comes out of a 1 mL batch as 16 and 4 drops, which is 4:1: the too-red test you had already thrown away. The Mix-Once Color Match Kit puts the free tools in the order a restorer meets them. Grade and photograph the model before any paint comes near it. Count how many drops of each paint make a mL through your own dropper: with the example red at 20 and orange at 26, counting 7:2 as drops leaves the orange 18.9% short, and 35:13 drops fixes it. Make every test batch a whole multiple of the ratio, tune one change at a time, then mix the whole job once with a reserve, sized so every part lands on a 0.1 mL mark: three airbrush coats plus a 2 mL reserve mix as 6.3 mL, 4.9 of red and 1.4 of orange. Thin each session from the jar, never the stock, and write the recipe down. Every figure is computed by the site's own calculators and every worked number is an example, tagged as one. It is a method, not a painting course or a valuation, and every paint and thinner label comes first. Included: 7 steps, a drop count and test log, a job batch planner, recipe cards, reference tables for common color and wash ratios, and a quickstart, plus a personalised sheet worked out from the ratio, wash or condition scores you entered on the site.

Look inside

Two full pages from the kit, exactly as printed. Click either to read it at full size before you decide.

What is in it

• Grade it before you touch it: the before grade and photographs, and touch or leave
• Count your own drop: drops per mL for each paint, and the ratio in drops for your paints
• Test in batches that are the ratio: the smallest exact batch and what 1 mL does to it
• Tune in steps you can undo: the ratio ladder, and the mix between two bracketing tests
• Mix the whole job once: coats, reserve and a batch whose every part lands on a mark
• Thin the session, not the stock: three starting points, and the color as one pot
• Write the recipe and keep the reserve: the recipe card and the labeled jar
• Working pages: a drop count and test log, a job batch planner and recipe cards
• Reference tables: common color ratios, wash ratios and your measuring marks
• A quickstart, safety and small print: label first, ventilation, old paint

The kit picks up where the free Paint Mix Ratio Calculator leaves off. The calculator splits a color ratio into mL and drops; the kit sets it beside the weathering wash and condition grade tools, in the order a restorer meets them: the model graded before it is touched, drops counted for your own paints, test batches that are the ratio exactly, tuning in steps you can undo, the whole job mixed once with a reserve, only each session thinned, and a recipe card that remixes the color. A method, not a painting course or a recommendation of any brand, and every paint and thinner label comes first.