color codes for silver vs metal ?

[Steffen]

thank you very much for the analysis, Mike!

I would like to add this info:

color 494:
occurs also in p\studel.dat - this is what color 494 at its time had been added for:
a "symbolic" color, intended to make electric studs show yellow contacts in instructions.

usage in file 2895 seems to be an error to me, I would have used color 383.

usage in 2986c01.dat may have been done because the underside contacts are intended to be used
together with electric studs. Here are instructions I found by checking the instructions of sets on peeron which contain
that part:

http://www.peeron.com/scans/6483-1/23/ - underside cannot be seen, no contribution to our discussion

http://www.peeron.com/scans/8082-1/7 - underside visible, appears yellow in instructions

http://www.peeron.com/scans/8480-1/139 - underside seems to be not shown in yellow

http://www.peeron.com/scans/6979-1/16 - electric studs clearly shown in yellow, but underside of motor not shown

http://www.peeron.com/scans/6484-1/11 - electric studs shown in yellow, underside of motor not shown