Been a loyal FLOQUIL paint user for years. Great product but the smell and toxins are not healthy. Went to H & R Train show this past summer in Pinellas Park. John Lee from “Badger” was demonstrating MODELflex “railroad colors” water-based paint line. Supposedly durable and easy to use. What I found impressive was that there was almost no smell when I put my nose 1/2" away from the bottle opening and sniffed! Inside the Badger brochure was a nice picture of a Burlington Northern NW5 switcher that he airbrushed with this paint and then decaled . I’ve been considering switching to this paint mainly for the low toxicity exposure. I’m still a little skeptical.
Are any of you using MODELflex? If you are, how does it compare with the solvent based paints you’ve used before? Any problems of painting peeling off when you pull off masking tape? Did you need to increase or decrease air brush fan distance or air pressure? Thanks for your feedback![8)]
I have used the ModelFlex paint to paint the CSX YN3 colors on two Athearn units. The paint did come off in some areas when I removed the masking tape. There was no odor and as far as psi----I used 20-30psi. I think they recommend 20. I’m also a Floquil fan, but at the time these colors weren’t available.
Love it. I used to use Floquil but now I use Modelflex and am 100% pleased with it. Easy clean up, no harmful fumes, and excellent mixed of prototype colors.
Have you ever had the masking tape peel paint like empirevalley mentioned? Is there perhaps a longer “curing” time required before masking for other colors?
Thanks.
Have used it before and liked it, turn the psi down to 15 to 20psi. No smell, no headaches from the oil based fumes. Only problem was thinner based colors,white,yellow,try 2 light coats of these instead of one heavy one.Try a cheap boxcar car to get a feel for the paint. Good luck.swdave
You have to make sure the surface onto which you spray the first color is clean (no oils, etc) so the base paint adheres well; then allow the second color to set-up but not cure; then peel off the tape at a sharp angle.
I put masking tape onto glass first to remove some of the stickiness. That seems to help.
I’ve used it since it appeared on the market. I also use many other brands of acrylic paints. They are, mostly, interchangeable and intermixable. You are not restricted to using just one brand.
Modelflex sprays great. Brushes poorly. I only thin with water, (Some colors, as needed) about 20lb pressure reading when air flow is fully on, about 3 inches tip to surface. Badger Universal. It does not have a good shelf life when opened.
My druthers of train store paint is Polly Scale. It has to be thinned a bit for spraying, but has enough body for occasional brush work. But I don’t hesitate if the color I want is only in Modelflex.
No masking tape problems with any acrylic. I clean models with Polly Scale Plasti-Prep. I use Tamiya masking tape or 3M Fine Line tape. I leave paint store masking tape for house painting and drafting tape for drafting. My yearly cost for masking tape is about the same as a bottle of paint. Why cheap out?
Ya know … I could never get the stuff to work out for me. Granted, that was about 7 years ago…but it seemed to me that the colors were off and I could never get things to airbrush.
I have ben using the Accuflex/Modelflex paints for about 7 years with satisfactory results. The issues that I have had are constistancy, which was more of a mixing problem. Putting a couple of BBs in each bottle helps get a better mix. And the other has been the silver. No matter how I mix it is always seems too watery and quick to seperate.
They’re easy to clean up after and to make weathering washes with.
Who knows the Model Flex colors to use for CSX YN3??!!
I’ve been trying to find out for a year and no one seems to know!
I’ve heard that Model-Flex B&O Dulux Gold is the color for the yellow.
What is the blue?
Does anybody know the colors for the SFRTA Tri-Rail paint scheme? The blue seems to be a close match to B&M blue. I’m not so much concerned about the green and orange since the decals put out by Microscale have the stripes and pilot striping. I’m a Floquil/Polly-S user and will try the ModelFlex.
Accuflex was an acrylic paint that Badger tried out at first. There was a problem with the original formula and Badger then came out with Modelflex paint. Other than being ‘acrylic’, they are not the same paint.
The nice thing about Modelflex is that it is ‘airbrush’ ready for the most part. 15-25 lbs of air pressure is all that is needed to spray it. I still use Polly Scale, buit really like Modelflex better for spraying.
When it was first released it was fantastic, then a few bad batches appeared (turned out to be a manufacturing machine contamination problem), they fixed the problem but the bad batches left a sour taste in the market and they have never been able to get back their momentum in the market place.
Ditto. I use blue painters tape, (with a new clean edge). As far as paint lifting, it’s happened to from time to time with all the acrylic paints, It’s usually because I didn’t wait a good hour or two or because the adges of the masking tape were too loaded (shoot straight at the tape edges). It also helps if you prime the model.
For Airbrushing, thin the paint to a consistency od 2% milk to whole milk) with a medium tip (#3), Thinner I use for better paint flow is 80% water/20% Iso alcohol. Air pressure between 15 and 25 psi. Always strain the paint to remove any lumps and undesolvable/dry particles (from the cap). Paint should go on wetter than you’re used to with solvent paints, but just short of running.
Rinse airbrush asap with water after finishing each color. I do not recommend using any solvents for cleaning unless you’re done for the day and are breaking down the airbrush. Any solvent contact with acrylics can cause the works to gum up. Water or my thinner mix is usually sufficient. Once a month (I paint a lot) I break everything down and soak in some laquer thinner, give everything a good scrub, let everything air dry completely before reassembling.
One quirk of painting with acrylics, is paint build-up at the tip of the brush, I keep a wire brush handy to give the tip a few swipes every now and then while painting, others use a cotton swab and some alcohol.
Do practice some before you paint your first model, the technique is a bit different from painting with solvent paints.
Feel free to come with more questions.
Accuflex was an independent company, when they couldn’t recover from the contamination (in
I have to say, though…WOW! I posted this thread 7 years ago around the time I first joined this forum. Glad you to see that you helped to give it a “shot in the arm”. [;)]
I still use Modelflex from time to time and am still pleased with how smoothly it lays on a surface. You’ve received some very good tips here. The only tip I can add (which I always emphasize) is that just before you spray your model, do a practice test on a junker shell or piece of plastic (like discarded Compact Disc case) so that you can fine tune your technique. To me there’s nothing more annoying in an airbrush job than a rough or runny finish!
I was using it. I liked there light tuscan oxide red for painting WM freight cars. Seems like in the latest batch they either labeled there dark tuscan oxide or maroon tuscan oxide as light tuscan. So needless to say I am now in search for a new WM freight car color as who knows when they will get back to there original formula. I thought it was a single mishap and called them. They sent me a new bottle but it was the same. Offered to send them my last bottle of the correct color back but they were not interested. Their excuse was a simple color shift from one run to the next. Well going from brick red to mud brown is a heck of a color shift. Sort of like going from Rock Island Bankruptcy blue to Santa Fe blue and stating that it was a small color shift from run to run. Oh well, their loss.