First out the (painting) stable

Entry posted by 45609 December 27, 2012

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My antidote to the Xmas excess of food and drink has been to spend some time working towards completing the two A3s. Shown, in the raw, in the previous blog entry the last 2 to 3 weeks has seen both locos primed and painted. This has been a bit of a game with the weather but thankfully enough fair and dry hours have been found to get them done. Using cellulose paint (primers and top coats) gives a major advantage at this time of year as it is feasible to get a loco painted from start to finish in one or two days. The down side is the humidity and cold which can give problems with bloom of the paint as the thinner evaporates.

Day one is the etch primer and even though some say that overcoating is possible within a few hours I prefer to leave it 24 hours. Day two is the high build primer and top coat (or coats in this case). I don't always use a high build primer. It depends on the surface finish of the model. This time it was necessary as the whitemetal castings of the DJH kits had a few blemishes and porosity that would have shown through the top coat without it. So starting early one Sunday morning the grey primer was sprayed followed, about an hour later, by the brunswick green top coat. After a decent brunch, whilst the models dried in a warm airing cupboard, it was time to get to work masking off the bits I wanted to stay green. Some pre-prepared masking templates helped speed this laborious task up. Things like splasher and the firebox bottom edge shapes had been made from card a few days before so that duplicates could be cut from masking tape. By far the trickiest job was manipulating a long thin strip of tape along the running plate valance. By about 3pm the masking was done but the bloody weather had changed and the rain was falling. ######! It was a full week before the weather was fine enough to get back to the garage and spray the black.

The remaining work has been taken more slowly at the work bench. Hand painting a few areas to tidy up masking errors and application of the lining. This time I have used Fox Transfers A3 lining packs and I'm very pleased with how they have come out. The only area I have lined with the bow pen is the running plate valance. The remaining transfers and plates are Modelmaster/Jackson Evans items. The final stage was to give the whole lot a coat of satin varnish.