Ive decided to paint my rails with an air brush ,SOO would water base like poly scale be all right or would it break down with cleaning and scenery work where it would be subjected to alcohol and such ???
thought about “rustoleum” camouflage paint from a can , used this on some FT turnouts ,but it would be a headache dealing with the over spray, in more ways than one, but it seams durable and a real nice “dirty gray” color .???
just some quick input here would be helpful…Jerry
Jerry,
I use Floquil solvent base for years and never had a problem with it coming off or nothing… Others here find the smell offensive and harmful. I do not, 69yrs old and still using it…
Cheers,
Frank
i will tell you how i did it but you don’t have to accept what i say as gospel.
1=get plenty of tape and newspaper and mask off all the areas that you want to protect from over spray.
2=turn off all pilot lights including the water heater.
3=open all the windows you can (best done in warm dry weather) and put a fan in one window
4=load up the old air brush with 75% floquil grimy black and 25% thinner.
5=don your canister style respirator (a simple dust filter will not do)
6=give 'er hell. paint rail and ties from every angle you can reach.
after cleaning the tops of the rails and doing a little touch up around the switches by hand, i was ready for ballast. turned out pretty good.
charlie
Dear Friends
I’m close to the point of painting my son’s track and have watched a few YouTube videos on doing it. One fellow masks the points when he paints his track, but I don’t understand that. It’s all supposed to be painted, right?
Why wouldn’t a person use PollyScale over solvent-based paints? I’ve used both. PollyScale, to my inexperienced eyes, seems to work as well as Floquil solvent-based paints but without the smell. Just using those Floquil solvent-based paint pens makes my eyes burn.
–Jaddie
jaddie: you want to aviod spray or heavy painting around ANY moving or current carrying parts on turnouts , you well regret it in the long run … Jerry
There are multiple ways to attack this:
Once ballasted, the track really looks pretty good. I have not had problems with acrylic paint ‘washing off’ when doing scenery work. The ‘water’ in acrylic paint dries and you have ‘paint’ on the rails when it is dry. Even 71% isopropyl that I used full strength to ‘wet’ the ballast does not seem to lift paint on the track.
One other thing. For those who do not have an air brush - Do NOT hand paint the ‘hinge’ area and rail joiners - the paint will ‘flood’ in those areas and you will have non-stop electrical issues. A good case for an electrical feed for each section of track! Even with air brushing, be careful. If you had watched the Virginian series, Cody had small bits of masking tape covering the hinge area of the points.
Jim
I believe at our hobby shop I’ve seen bottles of rail weathering liquid that proportes to be electrical conductive and does not need to be cleaned off the rail tops. Does anybody have information and access to such a product?
This?
http://www.micromark.com/blacken-it-4-fl-oz,7267.html
I’ve tried it for things other than rail. It works better on some metals than others. Might be worth a try but I wouldn’t try to spray it. [D)]
Dear Jerry
Then what should one do to paint turnouts? Everything except the frog carries power, right?
I’m woefully inexperienced in this stuff.
–Jaddie
Blackener is useful for certain applications, but isn’t particularly effective when brushed onto rail, and will probably not perform very well if sprayed. You’re likely to get blotchy color and the chemicals involved can cause damage to plastic ties if not thoroughly cleaned up (I left some in place once on Micro Engineering flex track and it eventually partially dissolved ties). It can also cause conductivity problems around turnouts or unsoldered connections. Copper is a component of the blackener, and greenish copper oxide can show up on treated metal, which isn’t always simple to remove. Blackener is much more effective in the metal can be soaked in it.
Ijust looked up rail weathering solution in the walthers catalog it’s on page 263 of the 2013 HO reference book
don’t know if thats what your looking for but thought it might help
I wouldn’t spray paint the rails either, whether you’re using Floquil, PollyScale, or a rattle can. I used PollyScale because no one else living in this house appreciates the smell of Floquil, and I’ve found that the Pollyscale, once fully-cured, is tougher than Floquil.
Get a straight, fairly stiff 1/2" brush, and brush paint those rails - it’s actually faster than airbrushing because there’s no masking required, and you can work at it anytime you have 10 minutes or so to spare. Paint, clean the brush, cap the bottle. The wider brush means less dipping into the bottle to reload, while the stiff-ish bristles allow you to work the paint around moulded-on spike heads and other such details. Using a brush also allows you to paint both sides of both rails without spraying paint all over yourself. Even if your layout is normally seen from only one side, a digital camera can be placed on the layout to see scenes un-viewable in-person. I generally paint 10’-15’ of track (both sides of both rails) then wipe the top of the rails using a dry rag. The paint isn’t fully cured, and wipes off easily. Generally, I do one turnout at a time, then wipe the rail tops. I don’t recall exactly how long it took to paint the more than 300’ of track I have in service, but it was neither long nor difficult - actually, I found it to be quite relaxing.
Another drawback to spray-painting the rail is dust: all of the paint which doesn’t land on the rails or masking tape lands, usually already dry, on something else on the layout. You will get to enjoy this dust even months later, every time you need to clean your track. [swg]
Wayne
Most of this stuff, does not stick good to the rail, and comes off on your wheels - resulting in poor electrical pickup. The top of the rail that has had trains running on it should be shiny I have used this stuff on the sides of loco drivers and valve gear to get rid of the nickel plated look.
Jim
A “DCC friendly” typically has a dead frog, unless a Frog Juicer, relay or whatever is used to provide power to the frog. Such a turnout usually has jumpers to power the closure rails, and sometimes the points, so electrical contact between the point and stock rail isn’t critical. Sometimes failure can occur between the point and closure rail. Many older style turnouts have live frogs, and point rails that change polarity depending on which way they’re thrown.
As for painting, I use an airbrush or spray can for most track painting, but also brush painting at times. The only places I try to keep paint out of completely are the contact areas between points and stock rails on live frog turnouts (also known as power routing or just DCC UN-friendly). I mask the points of such turnouts by inserting scraps of styrene or strip wood into the gaps. Other than this masking, I paint turnouts the same as any other track, and I have no electrical contact problems as a result. If you get sloppy, you can create trouble for yourself, but use care and you should be fine.
I use ca rattle can after masking and come back and touch up areas, I then wash everything in an india ink formula and then put a rust solution on the rails.
Dear Rob
Thank you very, very much for this detailed answer.
I’ll probably paint my son’s track in the coming week and I definitely don’t want any problems with the expensive Walthers double crossover.
Thanks again, fine sir. I remember that you helped me out with a Zephyr question several weeks ago.
–Jaddie
BIGJERR:
I used mostly ME weathered track, also some Atlas flex track on my “Virginian” project, which is also in this category elsewhere, but didn’t like how dark the weathered track was. So once we had everything soldered, all feeder wires in, and everything masked, we airbrushed on Polly Scale roof brown with a bit of black, and I think it turned out pretty decent. I’ve had no problems so far after ballstinga third of the layout with the paint coming off…
I have never painted my rail before, but on the layout I am building now I am and I am using the rustoleum camouflage super flat brown. I do it in short sections and use plastic to cover anything I am worried about the overspray. I actually do my scene work in short scenes if you will so I am not painting it all at one time so I am not to worried about alot of overspray or smell etc. I put a very little 3-1 oil on my finger and run it on top of the rail so the paint doesnt stick as well and give the paint about 15 minutes to dry and then I hit the rail with an old brite boy and get the paint off the top of the rail and then wait for the paint to dry well and then hit the rail again with a little alcohol and a clean brite boy. This works well and easy and I love the look of the rail, makes my old code 100 look fantastic! I am going to do a sample piece of track, paint and ballast it and then use my air brush and some grimy black and do some weathering between the track to see how that looks. If anyone has done this please let me know how it looks.
Dugan
I use this on my N-scale layout. First off, Micro-Engineering make pre-weathered track with chemically-blackened rails done professionally, so you don’t have to do it. And the price over unweathered track is very reasonable.
I also use Atlas turnouts and some pieces of sectional track, so those I have to chemically blacken myself.
The blackening process does a great job if done correctly:
Hand-wash your unweathered track like dishes. Use dishwashing liquid and and old toothbrush to scrub off any oils on the track.
Get a shallow plastic tub (I use the blister packaging used in Atlas turnouts) and fill it with rail blackener - just enough to submerge the track.
Give it a good soak for a couple minutes, pat dry the excess from the ties with a paper towel.
Let dry for an hour or so, so the tracks are blackened.
Hand-wash the track again to rinse off any excess chemical residue (the blackener will not come off if done properly)
Lay down the rail, ballast and clean off the tops of the rails with a Bright-Boy or 600 &1200 grit sandpaper and burnish with a stainless steel washer.
And there you go…
If you need to blacken long stretches of flex-track, I strongly recommend buying the Micro-Engineering pre-weathered track. They do all the work for you and like I said, the price increase over the non-wea