I found a new Dulux paint for Dark Sand

Back in 2014 I started using Dulux Paints for Wargaming Bases and Terrain. Dulux paints are house paints and much, much cheaper than modelling paints like Tamiya and Vallejo. And I use a lot of paint on bases and terrain so saving money was a big incentive. But the last couple of times I’ve been to the Dulux shop they said “Sorry we don’t have 23YY48254 Medium W45 / RAL1001 any more.” This is the Dulux equivalent of Vallejo (123) 70.847 Dark Sand, a colour essential for flocking my bases. Oh, no. Disaster.

The good news is I’ve found an even better replacement.


Dulux TradeColour Sampler Paints for Modelling Terrain

A while ago I knocked up a chart of my “Dulux TradeColour Sampler Paints for Modelling Terrain”. It has the supplier codes and the colours and the Dulux equivalents. I painted over each of the patches lots and lots of times to ensure the colour was solid with none of the white paper showing through. This is to allow Dulux to scan the patches effectively. Their scanner gets confused if the white shows through.

Dulux TradeColour Sampler Paints for Modelling Terrain 2014-10-25
Dulux TradeColour Sampler Paints for Modelling Terrain 2014-10-25

You can see that some of the Dulux paints were different shades to their originals. For dark sand my original Dulux version was quite different to the Vallejo. Vallejo 70847 Dark Sand is a dark yellow colour with a hint of green and the Dulux code 23YY48254 Medium W45 has a hint of orange instead of the green. But for my purposes minor differences are unimportant. A difference with dark sand didn’t matter given I had dark earth below and would dry brush pale sand on top.

But having no dark sand was a problem. So off to the local Dulux shop once more.


Visit to Dulux

This time I remembered to take my chart into the Dulux shop with me. It made all the difference as I could ask them to scan (again) the original dark sand – Vallejo (123) 70.847 Dark Sand – to try to find a match. This time they got a much closer match. Bingo! The new Dulux code is DX-HCFN7NT4BF Medium W58. Here are the three colour patches together.

Dark Sand - Vallejo to Dulux
Dark Sand – Vallejo to Dulux

The Dulux guy was a bit worried that it was slightly darker the the vallejo version, and it is, but it is still much closer than the version I’ve been using for the last six years.


Purchase and home

So I ordered a can. I don’t need masses so I get the 250 ml Dulux TradeColour Sampler. For pale sand and dark sand these last me 2-3 years (I go through flat earth much quicker, about one can per year). The price has gone up since 2014, from £2.60 to £5.06, but still a bargain.

And finally I updated my chart.

Dulux TradeColour Sampler Paints for Modelling Terrain 2020-12-05
Dulux TradeColour Sampler Paints for Modelling Terrain 2020-12-05

6 thoughts on “I found a new Dulux paint for Dark Sand”

  1. The Dulux shop in Temple Fortune has a machine – they point a hand held gadget at a physical coloured sample (I used a deep blue sea hex), then press a button, and a machine mixes pigments which go in to a blank can, which they mix, and then hand you the exact shade of paint that they measured from your sample.

    Simple.

    Reply
    • Yes. That is exactly what I am talking about.

      Occasionally their machine can’t do a fix on a particular colour patch.

      And occasionally they change their colours so stop supporting a shade they had previously. This is what happened to the previous Dark Sand. But I have a better one now.

      Reply

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