Perhaps to illustrate PC's point ;
Pre WWII Rattrays, the framebuilder of the Flying Scot's, offered the stock colours in either Solid or Flamboyant finish...
Post WWII, they offered Solid, Flamboyant or Metallic...
Solids were errr... Solid colour.
Flamboyants were - translucent colour over nickel plating, later modified to translucent colour over a bright silver paint base.
Metallics were - much as they are today, but the reflective flakes seem considerably smaller giving a silvery sheen to the colour, rather than obvious flakes, and appeared to have been painted over a silver or gold ? base.
Raleigh seem to have made considerable use of the term "polychromatic" from the early 50s, but whilst it looks marginally metallic, I'm not entirely convinced as yet.
I've about 150 old bottles of Raleigh touch up paint in a variety of colours
dating from the 50s to the late 70s, that were stored in a dark dry store
for a long time, most of which still have liquid contents. One day I'll end
up airbrushing these onto test panels to try and recreate some of these
original finishes.
>From what I've seen, many modern British painters through interpretation
have strayed so far from what the original Flamboyants and Metallics were,
that asking for one specific finish, will not guarantee that's what you'll
get. Not that it's particularly the painters fault - they're only
interpreting what's "real" much as we do here, without any basis in fact.
Welcome back PC, good to see you got over the nightmare of these Johnnie Foreigner machines from PooJoe and Binelli !
Bob Reid
Stonehaven
Scotland.