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Hello all :)

 

I have been collecting n gauge for just over 3 years now, and I hate factory weathered finishes. I have now decided to weather it myself, and to show you how you to can do it.

 

The methods I will be using work on all scales, and works best on 00 gauge.

 

 

As-well as weathering, I will show you how to do certain other things with your loco's like fitting headcoate dics  

 

 

Ok, that said, This is the first thing I recommend.

 

 

I would recommend you use two pieces of wood ( only 5/6 cm wide) and screw them together.

 

Then, you should place some track onto it (mine is long enough for a rake of 7 coaches)

 

You then have 2 choices!!!!

1. - leave it as a board to weather against (i.e. you place your model onto the track and weather it on there ( would not advise!!!!!!)

2. - if you have a graham farish controller + wire to the track, you should solder the end of the wire onto it. 

 

Step 2  allows you to place your loco's + coaches onto the track after weathering and run them back and forth, so any paint on the pic ups will ware off.

 

 

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The paint you will need is here:

 

These are railmatch

 

1 - sleeper grime (code: 406)

2 - roof dirt (code: 403)

3 - matt varnish (code: 407)

4 - black (code: 205)

 

These were bought from http://www.howesmodels.co.uk/Railways/viewProducts.php?CatID=10

 

 

I must let you now know. I have not received my paint yet so do not order until I receive it ( it is arriving tomorrow)

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Ok,

 

before I start to weather, I need to be able to clean the airbrush.

 

Now, sadly I missed this stage when I ordered the airbrush. I need to buy brushes and fluid which can be used.

 

I will order this off amozon aswell.

 

If anyone can suggest a method of cleaning / what I need it would be appreciated.

 

thanks

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I'm not being funny, but if you intend to instruct everyone on how to weather, wouldn't it be an idea to see if you can do it first ? if this is your first airbrush...

 

And they are ' head code' discs not cote. I'll get mine....

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I'll do some fielding on this 'Interesting concept'.

 

Airbrush cleaning is rather dependent on what you are spraying.

I take it your Railmatch paint is enamel rather than Acrylic.

 

After every paint colour change you will want to run some cleaning agent through your airbrush.

The lovely paint jar with the screw on lid should be full of this.You can use White spirit or Turpentine Substitute.

This a much cheaper option than wasting thinners on a cleaning operation.

At the point where your air brush is running clear you are fine to change colours.

If you have been using Spray varnishes you will soon see the the difference between thinned varnish emerging from your

instrument and cleaning agent.

 

Do not leave paint in any of your jars,spray cups or the actual airbrush for any extended period unused.Thinned enamels will dry within very quickly

and will need to be removed.

 

As you develop a production line of pieces to be sprayed you will find very couple of days you will probably need to strip clean your airbrush.

This will be daunting and very necessary.Keep your user guide with you as you disassemble the various pieces for cleaning.You will probably need to remove the needle

and the head/regulator for cleaning.cleaning brushes are available for this task in order to decoke the working parts inside your pride and joy.

http://www.everythingairbrush.com/acatalog/Cleaning_products.html.This set met be good for a start and seems to include all you would need .In time you can rely on cocktail sticks and cotton buds.For now  get a kit you can depend on.

 

Do not attempt to disassemble your airbrush if you are in any way unsure how it will reassemble.Heavy builds up of paint with the airbrush will need to be scraped out or scraped off the various parts.

Do not overtighten parts and be careful not to cross thread any head-to body assemblies.This is firefighting advice from across the ether but it will cost you a lot of money otherwise.

 

You will find your early paint/thinners mixes will be a test of your knowledge and experience so you will be strip cleaning your airbrush within the first week.This is not a criticism but if your experience is nil with an airbrush your painting vs cleaning time will be about 50/50.

 

I admire your confidence and spirit in wanting to get straight on paint things with an airbrush then sell your finished masterpices on Ebay..I've been using an Airbrush for commission work on and off for about 30 years but i wrote my first' how to' this year. Preparation is everything. I look forward to your approach to this particular learning curve and wish you all the very best with it.

 

Failure to prepare means prepare to fail.

 

Best wishes

 

Eric & Gripper.

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I'll do some fielding on this 'Interesting concept'.

 

Airbrush cleaning is rather dependent on what you are spraying.

I take it your Railmatch paint is enamel rather than Acrylic.

 

After every paint colour change you will want to run some cleaning agent through your airbrush.

The lovely paint jar with the screw on lid should be full of this.You can use White spirit or Turpentine Substitute.

This a much cheaper option than wasting thinners on a cleaning operation.

At the point where your air brush is running clear you are fine to change colours.

If you have been using Spray varnishes you will soon see the the difference between thinned varnish emerging from your

instrument and cleaning agent.

 

Do not leave paint in any of your jars,spray cups or the actual airbrush for any extended period unused.Thinned enamels will dry within very quickly

and will need to be removed.

 

As you develop a production line of pieces to be sprayed you will find very couple of days you will probably need to strip clean your airbrush.

This will be daunting and very necessary.Keep your user guide with you as you disassemble the various pieces for cleaning.You will probably need to remove the needle

and the head/regulator for cleaning.cleaning brushes are available for this task in order to decoke the working parts inside your pride and joy.

http://www.everythingairbrush.com/acatalog/Cleaning_products.html.This set met be good for a start and seems to include all you would need .In time you can rely on cocktail sticks and cotton buds.For now  get a kit you can depend on.

 

Do not attempt to disassemble your airbrush if you are in any way unsure how it will reassemble.Heavy builds up of paint with the airbrush will need to be scraped out or scraped off the various parts.

Do not overtighten parts and be careful not to cross thread any head-to body assemblies.This is firefighting advice from across the ether but it will cost you a lot of money otherwise.

 

You will find your early paint/thinners mixes will be a test of your knowledge and experience so you will be strip cleaning your airbrush within the first week.This is not a criticism but if your experience is nil with an airbrush your painting vs cleaning time will be about 50/50.

 

I admire your confidence and spirit in wanting to get straight on paint things with an airbrush then sell your finished masterpices on Ebay..I've been using an Airbrush for commission work on and off for about 30 years but i wrote my first' how to' this year. Preparation is everything. I look forward to your approach to this particular learning curve and wish you all the very best with it.

 

Failure to prepare means prepare to fail.

 

Best wishes

 

Eric & Gripper.

 

Thank you very much. The airbrushing may take a while to get used to but thanks for the help.

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I'm not being funny, but if you intend to instruct everyone on how to weather, wouldn't it be an idea to see if you can do it first ? if this is your first airbrush...

And they are ' head code' discs not cote. I'll get mine....

To be honest, that was fairly rude. This may bemy first attempt, but I have read books etc... Saying this is the best method.

 

I don't know what you mean by " I'll get mine", but I am guessing you are insulting me AGAIN. You know, I am a lot younger than you, and this is not helping my confidence.

 

If you don't like the way I am doing this then please, leave me alone and all of the other viewers on this topic, as my intent is for help and advise NOT HOW TO BE THE RUDEST PERSON.

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It looks from the picture as though you have two airbrushes. 

If one is described as fine and the other medium,Leave the fine one alone till you have your paint mixes mastered for spraying.

I would recommend you leave the fine on in ti box for a least 6 to 9 months genuinely.otherwise you will only be cleaning it.

 

Master the medium airbrush to your satisfaction before you move on to the finer one.

 

Practice on scrap paper.See how fine you can set you lines up with the medium airbrush.

The obvious advice with a airbrush it to build up the paint in coats from barely visible first coat(leave to dry) to five or six coats later

where you have full depth and coverage.

 

The other advice would be watch some You tube videos on airbrushing and get some books ordered from amazon.

You will find Trial,error and cleaning will eventually give you the results your looking for.

Do not commit any of your stock to the airbrush till you are in full command of what comes out with the air.

Please don't give up on this  post we all started somewhere and the whole point of a forum is that we all still learning.

 

Best wishes

Eric  & Gripper

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Hi Woolley
I think it's great to see an enthusiastic young person having a go at weathering. Eric & Gripper has given you some great advice as regard airbrushes. Please take the comments below as friendly advice:
 

i) Personally I would scrap this thread and start a new one along the lines of 'my first attempt at weathering N Gauge', that way you will get a much more positive response from people who will give you useful tips and confidence. A 'How to' guide will instinctively get peoples back up when you have little or no experience. 

ii) Learn to use the free image editor on this site..... N gauge is notoriously difficult to take good photos of and it will help with cropping as well as light contrast and brightness.
iii) Don't be afraid to fail.... often useful techniques can come out of disasters.
iv Do not weather your prize locos and stock until you have become proficient....I guarantee you that you will look back at your early work with a sense of disbelief at how bad it was. There are plenty of old bodies that can be bought on ebay to practice on.
v) Do not litter your thread with pointless posts about waiting for paint to arrive etc..... it will turn people away from reading your threads...try to post with photos.
 
Maybe in a year or two you could revisit this thread and start again with all the knowledge that you learned. A 'How to' guide should be exactly that so you need to tell people  what you did to get to a stage. So for the fitting of headcode discs to a Farish class 20 I would suggest doing something like this (by no means perfect but you get the idea):
post-3594-0-71005800-1372768772.jpg
Oh and rob was not being rude with the 'get mine' comment..... it is a reference to a comedy program that all of us over a certain age would know :) 
Please take my comments as friendly advice and I wish you every success with your weathering.
 
M

 

 

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Oh no, I can be a lot ruder than that.....

However, all I'm saying is if you label a thread , " how to..." , it generally means you , a) have done it before, b) are good at it.

 

I wouldn't label a post " how to do brain surgery" , if I had a) never done it, b) didn't know if I was good at it.

 

I'm not trying to undermine your confidence but as has been pointed out, airbrushing isn't easy at all.

I understand by your tone, and possibly immaturity that you are easily offended. This was not my intention, just a bit of advice.

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A good way of practising with the airbush is to get a bottle of Ink and practice on paper. Another way which is what I did was to pick up some cheap watercolours from poundland, mix up some thin mixes and again practice on paper, both these mediums are easily rinsed out of the airbrush with water.

 

Also this site is well worth a read, the Harbour Freight airbrush is very similar to what you have and the stripdown is the same, I know this as I have the same brush as you.

 

https://sites.google.com/site/donsairbrushtips/home

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Friendly and helpful advice from everyone.

 

You may wish to start a thread as Mercig kindly suggested that directly appeals to new modellers.

Your learning curve will be a step by step guide and since you have mentioned your age ,will

help give credence to your techniques and experience. Your age group is vital to the hobby and its

future.This is your catchment area and these are your potential students.

 

I think on first viewing we were all a little apprehensive of a 'How to' from someone who is learning

the fundamentals. We are all here to support ,help and develop your skills,and want only the best for you.

Post your results as you go and take any replies as valuable learning material.

One of the many reasons for a good forum such as this is the ability to learn from other people mistakes..

 

You have a lot of fine work to show us in the future and we look forward to seeing it.

You might not agree with all the replies you receive but they are generally well intentioned and a guide for the future.

 

Kind words and support are all you need you can put the rest in yourself.

 

Best regards

Eric & Gripper

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Hi Woolley

I think it's great to see an enthusiastic young person having a go at weathering. Eric & Gripper has given you some great advice as regard airbrushes. Please take the comments below as friendly advice:

 

i) Personally I would scrap this thread and start a new one along the lines of 'my first attempt at weathering N Gauge', that way you will get a much more positive response from people who will give you useful tips and confidence. A 'How to' guide will instinctively get peoples back up when you have little or no experience. 

ii) Learn to use the free image editor on this site..... N gauge is notoriously difficult to take good photos of and it will help with cropping as well as light contrast and brightness.

iii) Don't be afraid to fail.... often useful techniques can come out of disasters.

iv Do not weather your prize locos and stock until you have become proficient....I guarantee you that you will look back at your early work with a sense of disbelief at how bad it was. There are plenty of old bodies that can be bought on ebay to practice on.

v) Do not litter your thread with pointless posts about waiting for paint to arrive etc..... it will turn people away from reading your threads...try to post with photos.

 

Maybe in a year or two you could revisit this thread and start again with all the knowledge that you learned. A 'How to' guide should be exactly that so you need to tell people  what you did to get to a stage. So for the fitting of headcode discs to a Farish class 20 I would suggest doing something like this (by no means perfect but you get the idea):

attachicon.gif20 8042 002r copy.jpg

Oh and rob was not being rude with the 'get mine' comment..... it is a reference to a comedy program that all of us over a certain age would know :) 

Please take my comments as friendly advice and I wish you every success with your weathering.

 

M

 

Ok

 

I will abandone this and make a new "my first attempt", and come back to this later. Thanks. I love your work by the way

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Oh no, I can be a lot ruder than that.....

However, all I'm saying is if you label a thread , " how to..." , it generally means you , a) have done it before, b) are good at it.

I wouldn't label a post " how to do brain surgery" , if I had a) never done it, b) didn't know if I was good at it.

I'm not trying to undermine your confidence but as has been pointed out, airbrushing isn't easy at all.

I understand by your tone, and possibly immaturity that you are easily offended. This was not my intention, just a bit of advice.

Ok I apologise for my out burst.

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Friendly and helpful advice from everyone.

 

You may wish to start a thread as Mercig kindly suggested that directly appeals to new modellers.

Your learning curve will be a step by step guide and since you have mentioned your age ,will

help give credence to your techniques and experience. Your age group is vital to the hobby and its

future.This is your catchment area and these are your potential students.

 

I think on first viewing we were all a little apprehensive of a 'How to' from someone who is learning

the fundamentals. We are all here to support ,help and develop your skills,and want only the best for you.

Post your results as you go and take any replies as valuable learning material.

One of the many reasons for a good forum such as this is the ability to learn from other people mistakes..

 

You have a lot of fine work to show us in the future and we look forward to seeing it.

You might not agree with all the replies you receive but they are generally well intentioned and a guide for the future.

 

Kind words and support are all you need you can put the rest in yourself.

 

Best regards

Eric & Gripper

Ok understood. I will star a new one later

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