How do you paint and weather your trucks and wheels?

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

Hi guys:

I seem to be full of questions tonight.

How do you paint and weather your truck side frames and wheels?

I recall seeing Cody Grivno using a micro brush to paint wheels as opposed to putting them in a masking jig and spraying them. How do you do it?

Also, what techniques and paints do you use for painting side frames? If I used my airbrush I’d be concerned about gumming up the moving parts especially with sprung trucks.

How well does paint stick to Delrin (acetal plastic) trucks?

How do you keep paint out of the axle holes if you are air brushing the side frames?

The reason I am asking is that I just finished painting a small fleet of stock cars, but the trucks and wheels still need to be painted.

Thanks

Dave

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I use a fine paint brush on them, starting of with a grimy black color, then a wash of a couple differnt rust colors. Only used a airbrush a couple of times to spray light coat of dust on some. You could put a piece of tape over the axles holes to keep out paint or use a spare pair of wheels to keep out the paint also.

I use acrylic paint and have no problems with it sticking.

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Dave,First I try to find a easier way of painting wheels and trucks.

So,I use a Minuteman Scale Models wheel jig and a rail brown paint pen. For trucks I use a light rust paint and a small flat paint brush. I use a old Testors brush handle for holding the trucks. I lightly push the trucks down on the handle until it is snug.

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For weathering, I use a paint pen from my local craft store. I just use a brown and it looks good enough for me! It isnt the most professional way to do it, but it works out in the end!

Hope this helps,

Chris

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To avoid unrealistic brush marks, I’ve shot mine with grimy black paint using an airbrush. There are some jigs you can buy to make spraying wheels faces easier.

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I cut down a piece of 1 x 2 pine. The trucks fit down over the pine, a small finish nail locates them thru the bolster screw hole and keep them in place while I turn the wood and spray the trucks. I can paint 2 pairs at a time.

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First thing I do for the truck side frames is hit them with a coat of Dupli Color adhesion promotor (the stuff used on real car plastic bumpers).This kills the shine and leave a finish that acrylic paint and weathering powders can stick to.

I usually just use a micro brush and rust coloured paint to do the wheels.

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For painting wheels, I use a brush - just small enough to fit so that the visible portion of the wheel’s face and rim can be covered without getting too much paint on the sideframe as the wheel on the opposite side is turned. I usually use the same brush to do the back of the wheel and the axle, too, although a wider one would be faster. You can do this while the trucks are still on the car, but in most instances, I do it before installing the trucks.
In most cases, I don’t paint the sideframes, although for those roads that did, a brush works well enough. Most paint doesn’t stick well to Delrin sideframes, but trucks don’t get handled too much, so it shouldn’t be a problem.
I have, on occasion, used a sandblaster to put a little “tooth” on the sideframes, using baking soda as a medium. For this, I remove the wheelsets. I generally stick with the wheels which came with the trucks, and do prefer plastic ones, mostly because the overly-wide wheel treads are less noticeable in black (they’re also quieter).

For paint colour on wheels, use a rust-like colour for cars with roller bearings - front and rear faces and the axles. The same shades are suitable for cars with solid bearings, but only on the backs of the wheels and the axles. For wheel faces, black, brownish-black, greenish-black, etc., etc. are all suitable - the wheel faces get covered in oil from the journal boxes, then any dirt and dust kicked-up as the car moves generally sticks to that.

When I weather the car, I may use any combination of brushwork, pastels, or airbrushing, but the final step is almost always, for any method, airbrushing. For this, the paint is thinned using about 90% thinner. The car itself is weathered as desired, then I put the car on a piece of track in the spray booth, moving it back and forth with my free hand while spraying the wheels, trucks, and underbody. Keeping it moving prevents having only portions of th

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Sometimes, I remove the wheels from the cars and other times I keep them there. I use a combination of artist paints burnt unber and sienna for the wheels. I also put Dullcoate on them to bind chalk powders such as brown or orange. Those colors make great rust.

The amount and colors of weathering varies to avoid uniformity.

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I remove the wheels from the trucks, otherwise it is just a big bother to get the entire wheel. For best results, I think it is worth the time to take the wheels out of the truck.

For wheels, in common with Larry I use a Minuteman painting jig (one for 33" wheels, one for 36" wheels) where the thick acrylic of the jig protects the wheel treads from being painted. I put a tiny amount of an Ambroid masking product on the tips of the axle bearings - I can flick that off with a fingernail when the paint is dried.

WARNING: I tried removing some of the gunked up paint on my Minuteman jigs because I could no longer read the imprinted 33" or 36" size. Bad idea - acrylic reacts very badly even to rubbing alcohol and it became brittle.

I made my own similar jig out of styrene for some wheels which appear to be smaller than 33" that I found on some Roco flatcars. By coincidence a regular paper punch was the perfect size. Some intermodal flatcars also have smaller than 33" wheels.

For truck sideframes, I have a board of wood with holes at intervals which hold a series of 8 or so large skewers or dowels pointing up (dowels sharpened in a pencil sharpener) and I simply rest the truck’s bolster hole on the tip of the dowel or skewer. A bit of masking tape covers the bearing openings. (By the way that same jig can be used to paint freight car frames and even bodies, since the dowels are removable and can be slightly bent this way or that to accomodate various spacings for mounting holes.)

For paint I use a variety of rattle can flat reds or browns or even dark olive greens, Krylon or similar Camoflage colors. Sometimes I paint two colors at the same time. I have never had problems with rattle can paint sticking to wheels or sideframes, even those made of slippery engineering plastic. Of course I don’t go picking at them with a fingernail, nor do they hav

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Jim,I been brush painting for years and the main thing to do in order to avoid brush marks is to have a quality brush and paint. Just dip the tip of the brush into the paint and not to overload it. Any excess paint can be removed by brushing a thick paper towel.

A lot of today’s quality paint can be easily brush on.Doesn’t hurt to have several sizes of micro brushes on hand for detailing-edges of steps,step handrails etc. If one has a study hand he can use a micro brush and paint the brake cyclinder rods.

However,I find a paint pen for painting wheels is hard to beat.

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I find that a black or brown Sharpie pen makes a solid base color and goes on very quickly. A rust colored acrylic wash can then be applied to create a more weathered look and cut any remaining sheen without having to worry about covering every last bit of the wheel.

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The key thing is to kill the plastic gloss of wheels and sideframes. I brush paint the wheel faces. Friction bearing truck journal boxes leaked oil onto the wheel faces, giving a dark gray tone. I paint then with grimy black. Roller bearing trucks don’t leak oil, and the wheel faces go a light brown color, partly rust and partly mud kicked up and dried on the wheel face. I paint them various shades of brown.

All sideframes get spray painted with a rattle can. Dark gray auto primer for locomotives and passenger cars, red auto primer for freight car trucks. I wash the trucks with hot soapy water, scrubbing with a toothbrush. I mask the axle holes with tape. The rattle can lacquers stick well to the sideframe plastic.

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I too use a paint pen. My current ones are Floquil but obviously I won’t be getting any more of those. The second I set I got was from testors railroad colors. It comes with Rail Brown, Rust and black. I hardly ever use the black. I start with the Rust color and then once its dry I go over it with the Rail brown color. The color combo is good enough for me. I use all Intermountain wheelsets for cars that go on the layout and paint them in batches so. The painted wheel faces indicates that the car is equipped with resistor wheelsets.

As for the plastic trucks. I have used a mixture of Acrylics and Floquil. I like Floquil for weathering because it has a good tooth into the plastic because it is an organic (as in chemical) based paint and actually etches into the plastic.

I usually will have a certain layer of color on the trucks (either airbrushed or painted on) which is similar to the car’s color. I then use an airbrush (when I am weathering the whole car) to weather the car and trucks at the same time. I use a set of dummy wheelsets to protect the needle-point housing from getting painted.

Here you can see one of the cars I weathered with the combo colored metal wheels I mentioned previously.

The trick I use to weather the trucks is to actually set the car on a scrap piece of track and actually aim for the ties. This cause the paint to richchet and only leaves a controlled amount.

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Great topic and many, many great responses.

For wheels, I’ve been using the Laserkit jig, and I like the results. I had a ton of wheels painted one night in a short amount of time. Most of the time, I just use paint brushes. Grimy black for trucks, or sometimes the body color if I’m going for a newer car, plus I love the look of the latter. I’m going to start dry-brushing earth tones and grimy black to bring out the detail and age the trucks. For wheels, I paint the surfaces, back and front, plus the axle, a rust color. I’m going to start using rust as a base-coat, and add some grimy black to the wheel faces. Virtually none of my rolling stock have roller bearing trucks.

Alvie

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Badly, wif a brush and acrylics!!

Looks OK at three feet in a very dark room wif one eye closed.[;)]

Cheers, the Bear.[:)]

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Bear,Looks like a large brush was overloaded and paint was applied a tad to thick. I have some trucks that needs painting and if I find time today after my two doctor’s appointments I’ll paint one and take a photo.

Gordon Ramsey would have a fit if that was food. [(-D]

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Thanks everyone for all the suggestions! Sorry I didn’t respond sooner but my back is not happy these days.

I’m going to go back and re-read your ideas to see which ones I want to try out. I like the idea of not having to remove the trucks from the cars or the wheels from the trucks. I’ll have to practice my coordination though!

Regards

Dave

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In the process of weathering some trucks right now. Bad thing i could not remember what i use for a base coat. Think i use raw umber. I have never tryed the paint pens, somewhere along the line i picked up a gloss black and flat black they are still in the plastic. Do they have a life span? or should they still be good? They are at lest 10 years old.

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I’d suspect the paint pens are toast given the nature of their design. However, some brands allow you to remove and clean the felt tips, so if the paint is still liquid you may be able to ressurect them. Messy job though.

Dave