Painting the El Cheapo wagons.

dunnyrail

dunnyrail

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We use spray cans from Halforda, they Greay undercoat works well. We have used that as the base colour as that is fine for what we want. However if you want a different colour well obviously it works well as an undercoat as well. Hope this helps,
JonD
 
Halfords also do a primer specifically for plastic. It is usually yellow.
 
Forgive me for asking, have you roughened the surfaces? Let's say with something like a Scotch Brite pad.
 
I've not done any of the wagons, but I have had good results on the carriages with the Dulux spray can base coat. Although that was using the Dulux paints available in Australia, and I don't know if there's a difference between that and what's available there. I prepared the surface with very fine wet and dry and it applied very well. The only nuisance I found is that the factory seems to use whatever material is around at the time so there were differences in the plastic on two of the seven I painted (and in the material on the couplings on six of the seven!). Those two took a bit more effort to get a decent surface on, but the end result was still good.

-David Morris
 
You can get a primer called something like Plastic Primer at motoring shops in the UK. If you spray this on first increases adhesion, then a primer and top coat(s). Don't worry when you spray the palstic primer on when it goes all blotchy, it doesn't affect the end result.
 
bazzer42 said:
I'll second the rough'em up followed by Holts or whatever. The attched link if it works shows a couple resprayed in primer and then aluminium. All bought for £4 a can from the village car spares shop.

http://www.gscalecentral.net/fb.ashx?m=154451
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Thirded!

I rubbed the 2 NQD coaches down with fine glasspaper before painting.

Flat surfaces though, so relatively easy compared to a tank....
 
As John (dunnyrail) has said, Halford rattle cans work really well on these beasties if you use their own rang of plastic primer too.

It tend to give mine a rubbing down with very fine wet n dry to dull the surface a bit and help the primer to stay stuck.

Edit: Read entire thread before replying - pretty much what everyone else has said :bigsmile:
 
P.S. - the Army painter range does some useful colours and a very good matt varnish. Not cheap at £8 post free on ebay and have spurious "lord of the rings" names. Used with a primer they last for ages (big cans)....I like big cans of goblin snot.
After thought - the crane (yellow) and canopy (green) are from Army painter in link above. The Newquida van is totally car primer apart from the wizard phlegm yellow door.
 
Cyclone said:
My first scratch build is getting near painting time.

Its a four plank wagon made from wood, whats the best way to paint it?
Spray or brush?
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Completely up to you. Spraying is quicker although I would exercise caution with the temperature as low as it is at the moment (as per Cyril's recent experience in another thread). Brush painting tends to be more thorough as you can get the paint into all the nooks and crannies.

Spray painting also usually gives a smoother finish and would be essential if you were modelling the high gloss finish on a model car or suchlike, but most railway rolling stock was brush painted, so brush painting is actually more realistic.
 
Traditionally, the paint was very thin for brush application and was applied very thinnly in lots of coats - an expert can get a finish that is very near spraying.
I watched a guy finishing off a Terrier tank on the K&ESR many years ago. Sanded down between every layer - it took ages but the result was superb.
 
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