Painting railway engines.

[waggy]

What types of paint is favoured by you all? I am starting to paint and assemble my 5" Duchess which will be in BR green. I've used Holts car sprays with some success but find it chips easily. Your thoughts would be very much appreciated.



Dave.

[chrissyvine]

Hi Waggy,

Very difficult this painting lark, it took me two years to paint a 7.25" B1. More than half of that was making mistakes....

I used the precision paints synthetic coach enamel, it is difficult to spray but seems quite suitable when finished with regard to temperature resistance etc.

You had a problem with the paint chipping off. Were you painting brass? If you are it is vital to start with an etch primer and be scrupulously careful with degreasing.

if you want to know more about etch primers, let me know....!

Chris.

[waggy]

Hi Chris,
Thanks for the reply. I would very much appreciate any information on etch primers.
I know brass is a pain to get paint to stick to but I found the Holts grey primer very good, no more chipping off than anybody elses loco's. The colour that chips easiest is gloss black, I suppose it is harder drying than other colours. The loco is Brunswick Green, this is fairly flexible but black will not tolerate movement or flexing.
Thanks a lot,

Dave.

[chrissyvine]

Hi Dave,

I found the best Etch primer came from the firm Trimite ltd. They have branches all round the country, look in yellow pages. They do a one pack called HP20 and a two pack called SAP 3.

You really must use an etch primer on brass, and it makes an excellent base on iron and steel as well.

U-Pol make a good spray can etch primer but it does not go on so finely as the above. You can get it at some car refinishing suppliers, or they will have an alternative.

I had so much grief painting my locomotive and there is so little in print worth reading one the subject that I decided to write down what I learnt. I am in the middle of the book now and hope to get it into print later this year......

Hope that is helpful
Chris.

[waggy]

Chris,
Many thanks for the information. Good luck with the book.

Regards,

Dave.

[iprocter]

I can qualify that with brass you must use an Etch primer. My experience with this was for 71/4" gauge Royal Scot. Etch primers come in two types - single pack and twin pack which needs mixing prior to spraying. I have tried both types and favour the twin pack for spraying. Single pack is OK for brush painting and requires a special thinners when spraying. The paint must be 'wet' when contacting the metal. For surfaces which are not absolutely flat, I used twin pack etch primer, followed by several coats of twin pack filler primer. This hides any blemishes,dries to a very tough finish and can be lightly rubbed down. Finally finishing off with Phoenix Precision Paint Synthetic enamel. This will give a long lasting durable finish. Do not clean the brass with white spirit - it take ages to evaporate. If you get any runs in your paintwork, lightly wet and dry away the top surface of the 'run' revealing the darker soft paint. Leave this to harden and repeat with wet/dry. The run will eventually be flattened out and be the right colour. When spraying I use about 60psi and have tried up to about 35% thinners - (Spraying Synthetic Thinners). I obtained the primers from The Paint Company near Iver Bucks UK formerly Technical Paint Services
Regards
Ian P