Painting Advice

[ChufferParticipant @chuffer]

A short while after lockdown started some 2 years ago my wife suggested to me that I make a start on the Class 20 electric loco which I had bought the castings etc from Dan Jeavons some 15 years before!

I'm now at the stage of painting before installing (with help I may add) the control system purchased from Mtroniks. Both bogies have been painted using Plastikote Metal Primer and Satin Black which I find is one of the few rattle can paints where runs are few and the coverage is good. The chassis is an aluminium casting which I sprayed with Upol Acid 8 Primer followed by the Satin Black.

Now, I need to spray the buffer beam and buffer stocks red but although there is a model railway forum detailing car rattle can colours it doesn't seem to list a car colour for buffer beam red. Similarly, my loco will be an early example where the body is BR Green with the roof being grey so are there any suggestions for a car colour for this?

The model railway forum lists either Rover Brooklands Green or Ford Laurel Green for the body but with it being a gloss green fibre glass moulding I can't seem to find any advice on what primer to use.

Any advice or recommendations would be most welcome.

Chuffer

[ChufferParticipant @chuffer]

[MichaelRParticipant @michaelr]

For painting fibre glass you really need a Etch Primer Link

MichaelR

[ChufferParticipant @chuffer]

Michael,

Many thanks for the link which I have accessed and read.

I was rather hoping that an etch primer would be available in a ready to use spray can as I never seem to have much success when having to thin paints and the Class 20 body has lots of uneven surfaces.

Having used Upol Acid 8 etch in a spray can which adhered well with no runs straight out of the can I was disappointed that they don't seem to make one suitable for fibre glass. Do any other forum members have experience of painting a fibre glass loco body moulding and if so what did they use?

Regarding the enquiry about rattle can colours suitable for the grey roof and red buffer beam – are there any recommendations of suitable car colours from forum members?

Chuffer

[Dave HalfordParticipant @davehalford22513]

You need to make very sure that the release agent has been removed from the gel coat surface. I used to use bees wax for boat hulls. Degreased then a light 1000 grit wet and dry, celly primer and gloss just like a car.

Hopefully as the moulding is not self coloured they didn't use anything with silicones in it.

[ChufferParticipant @chuffer]

Dave,

Thank you for your advice.

I've had the moulding some 15 years since I bought it and the castings following a smallish football pools win. I collected it from Dan at his home in Kidderminster where he showed me the electric driven City of Truro and Prairie models he was working on. These were kept in a genuine hovel (so he said) which was his workshop/storage building at the bottom of his garden. A quite memorable visit.

I'm sure I'm not the only model engineer who has bought parts for a model and had them collecting dust for many years. In my case the fibre glass body moulding and aluminium chassis casting were both stood on end in the workshop and were religiously moved when I wanted to get something out of the rack of drawers they stood in front of! Lockdown was the catalyst for me to make a start.

The moulding is a sort of self coloured BR Green but I've done quite a bit of work on both the nose and cab ends as I want it to be an early example of a Class 20. As standard the moulding had a headcode box but Dan had my moulding made without this and I've added to it. It is shiny so I can go over it with 1000 grit to take the shine off of it, like I've done on the ends I've worked on. I have tried to insert photos of both ends but met with no success apart from losing all that I had already typed. I might have another try after I've posted this.

Chuffer

[ChufferParticipant @chuffer]

Well, I've managed to upload these photos – I hope. Progress has moved on quite a bit since I took these.

BTW for those of you who may have built a Class 20 the reason for the new buffers stocks is that being a member of the GL5 Main Line Association after making the 2 bogies and assembling these to the chassis I found the centreline of the buffers was about 3/8" too high. After much head scratching and looking at full size pictures of Class 20's the penny dropped that the buffer stocks on the aluminium chassis casting were cast in the middle of the buffer beam where on the protype there is a marked bias of them being towards the bottom of the beam. Mystery solved but involved cutting off the cast in stocks and making new ones.

Chuffer

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