I’m using the Woodland Scenics road system on my layout and am curius about the best way to do pavement markings. On my last layout, I used yellow colored pencil and then Pactra trim tape. I wasn’t really happy with the former and the latter is no longer available. What do you guys suggest for N Scale?
Take a look at the pen/pencil dept of your local hobby/craft store. There should be an ultra-fine point paint marker sold there (Marvy is a common brand) that is available with white and yellow opaque colors.
The best do it yourself stripes and so forth that I’ve ever seen were done by making up a stincile and using an air brush with flat yellow paint. I personally didn’t stripe my roads because my layout is set in the 1950s during the transition era and a lot of the roads and streets were unstriped at that time.
Tracklayer
I use Woodland Scenics dry transfers: yellow for the center lines, white for the edgings. Draw a thin pencil line where you want to have the markings, then lay the transfer over this so you can see it through the transfer backing. Then rub it down. Don’t worry if there are some spots where the transfer doesn’t fully take. On real roads the markings are rarely pristine.
Maybe take a look at finger nail decorative tape. I bought some of this stuff to use as metal banding. Here’s a link to white, I don’t know if it is glossy of matte you would have to search. The assorted rolls I got were only 1mm wide.
If you want yellow and don’t see it I bet you could lightly spray it or maybe use a Sharpie.
It will curve easily as you apply it.
Good Luck, Ed
I also discovered the fingernail tape on eBay a while ago. I found both white & yellow. It comes in various widths and is pretty thin so it indeed can be curved. The thinness is a bit of a double edged sword in that the opacity is a bit thin also. So its good for worn lines rather than newly striped roads. Sure beats masking and painting.
Dave
Remember also that yellow paint did not come into play until about 1972. I recall this because when I was a kid, my father and uncle and I went to Canada for the first time fishing, and I was 9 yrs old. When we entered Minnesota from Wisconsin, two things changed…one, they had the new yellow centerlines on their two lane Hwy 61, and two, they had the yellow left side passing triangle signs. It would be another year or so before they showed up in Wisconsin.
So anyone modelling earlier than the 70’s, it would be all white paint if they were marked at all. And no yellow triangles, just the white “Do Not Pass” sign.
Before the MUTCD standard of 1972, each state had different striping standards/patterns