washer bottle

[h3ae86]

I'm almost finished with my current build and I was looking at the washer bottle for the wipers and I was wondering how I could make it look more realistic, giving it that foggy look. could anyone tell me how I might do that?

[High octane]

Harold, I have painted washer bottles flat white and then used some pale blue painted on the bottom for the washer fluid and I was happy with the results.

[envious8420]

I use a thinned down white enamel with a slight tint of yellow over a dark primer. you could even use a blue under the thinned white to simulate the fluid at whatever level.

[crazyjim]

I follow the High Octane school of thought.

[Jon Cole]

I use a thinned down white enamel with a slight tint of yellow over a dark primer. you could even use a blue under the thinned white to simulate the fluid at whatever level.

What Jim says. You can also try Model Master Ivory, over the blue "fluid"

[MikeMc]

I'm cheap...flat white primer.....for yellowing, a wash of thinned clear orange, then paint the fluid with clear blue...This Impala was just restored so the bottle is still white

[VW Dave]

if it's molded in clear, just dullcote it simple as that. most of the clear ones are hollow on the bottom too so you can add a little bit of light blue paint inside if you like to look like there is fluid in the bottle.

That was my first thought as well, although all of the above ideas will work(depending on what color the part was molded in). If it is clear, I'd recommend trying this on a spare clear part or the sprue: wet sanding.

[fatkidd]

if it is in an easily "accessible" area, why not cut a small piece from a milk jug for the cloudy color and glue it over the existing bottle. or, like suggested, use white4 primer for the color and use a blue highlighter for the fluid and a green highlighter for the radiator overflow

[ra7c7er]

if it's molded in clear, just dullcote it simple as that. most of the clear ones are hollow on the bottom too so you can add a little bit of light blue paint inside if you like to look like there is fluid in the bottle.

That was my first thought as well, although all of the above ideas will work(depending on what color the part was molded in). If it is clear, I'd recommend trying this on a spare clear part or the sprue: wet sanding.

I do it a similar way for clear washer fluid containers. Very light blue on the inside and very thin white with maybe a tinge of yellow for the outside. You still want to see the blue inside but have the white over it.

If the part is molded in color just use a blue base coat and then thin white/yellow mix over it.

[Longbox55]

if it is in an easily "accessible" area, why not cut a small piece from a milk jug for the cloudy color and glue it over the existing bottle. or, like suggested, use white4 primer for the color and use a blue highlighter for the fluid and a green highlighter for the radiator overflow

If you're doing a late model, the coolant may not necessarily be green. GM from about '96-current is a pinkish orange, '01- current Fords and most Chryslers '01-'06-ish, as well as Mercedes-Benz use a gold coolant, later Chryslers use a red coolant. Toyota uses pink, and I've seen a medium blue coolant in late model Hondas. Aftermarket "mix with any color" antifreeze tends to be a greenish/gold clor, depending on brand. It's close to the old style green, but with a more yellow tone to it. If you get into performance aftermarket, Evans Waterless is purple.

Same goes for washer fluid, it's not all blue. in northern climaes, there's an anti-ice washer fuid that's pink, plus there's also a green washer fluid that's about the color of Slime tire sealant for cleaning bug guts off. That's usually sold in the south, but I've seen it up here, too.

[Casey]

Casting a windshield washer fluid reservoir in white resin would be a big improvement over either a molded-in-and-painted or a clear molded part, but you'd still need to address the fluid issue. The nice thing about casting parts like this is you can fill the mold part way, then either wait 'til the part has hardened to add some resin mixed with colorant (blue, orange, yellow- whichever washer fluid you're replicating) or add the colored mix as the resin is hardening.

I believe washer bottles are made from the same plastic as plastic milk containers, High-density polyethylene (HDPE), so they both have a similar opacity, which is not easily replicated since it's neither a 'solid' color nor competely transparent/'clear'. I'm going to experiment with some white and clear resin in an attempt to get the correct look, but so far all I've done is cast this Mopar reservoir in white resin, which IMHO, looks better than both a painted or clear-molded part, but still isn't totally correct looking:

[arby1949]

If it's clear, I have used Tamiya clear blue on the bottom half. Not too bad.

Rick