Wondering if I should paint the Rust on my track/ties before I lay it? Opinions?
Paint the track after you lay it as you will get bright shiny bits when you flex it from where the track nails were if you do it before.
What will you be using to paint the track? Airbrush, rusty rails painter, track painting marker pens, a paint brush? Depending on the method of application determines what order I put the different paint colours on.
Pre-weathering track makes sense if you are using fixed radius sectional track and/or you are weathering turnouts. However, if you pre-weather flex track, then bend it to the desired shape, the ties will move leaving unweathered spots along the adustable rail. I prefer to wait until after all track is laid, all wiring is complete, and all tie gaps under rail joints filled in before I paint/weather the track in place.
The new SIW will be a hybrid with fixed radius curves mostly and straights made from flex track with a few bends as needed.
On the old layout I simply used a paint brush and burnt sienna paste on the rails and I thought the effect was pretty good. I may go this route again. I don’t have an airbrush.
Personally, I like to do the switches first at the work bench and then do the flex track after it is down. I can always go back and blend in and touch up where needed. Be happy in your work.
Charlie
I suppose you could paint it, let it dry, then shift the rail a bit to expose the unpainted parts and touch them up.
Steve S
I preweathered flex track with a brush before putting it down. Made it VERY stiff, and then left shiny spots. Maybe less and finer grade paint would work better.
Dave
The other issue is soldering to painted track and metal joiners to painted track. Areas would need to be stripped, joined/soldered and painted again. Too much work.
I hate track painting. But I hate the toy like look of unpainted track even more. I could pay someone to paint and ballast …
NP.
LION paints tracks of him AFTER it is installed, and rail joiners soldered. To attach feeters not problem, just scrape a bit clean and solder. LION paints tops of rails, moves very quickly. Tops are easily cleaned with a scraper or even a fingernail.
Removing and then reinstalling painted tracks can be a problem, especially if you have used glue to hold down the ballast of ewe.
ROAR
I pre-weather hand-laid track… Rails get pre-weathered by me, or, if I find them cheap enough, I get the pre-weathered bulk rail from ME.
For pre-weathering flex, ME has a “weathering solution” that will do it, to match their per-weathered track, that should work as it is (near) water-thin. (It might stiffen things slightly… Unsure on that, as my flex of choice is ME, which is pretty stiff on its own.) You would still need to touch up joiners, but, that is a lot less paint than the whole thing. (Joiners stick out like a sore thumb otherwise…)
(Also unsure on if paint would have the same effect if thinned to a wash and built up in layers? Never tried it.)
Just throwing in a proverbial monkey-wrench… [;)]
I suppose you could, but then you would have to scrape away paint for the joiners and feeders. Painting after the track is down lets me solder up the feeders and the joiners before I paint. Going over the track again would make me feel like I was doing the job twice.
[D)] Caution Dunce alert;
On Thursday while I had my airbrush out I thought I would quickly spray my track for the roundhouse I am building. The next day I realized I’ll be taking the ties off for the part that goes inside the RH and will have to paint them again as there will be lots of shiny bits then.[:-^]
I swear by ME pre-weathered track. While stiff, I like that the’re no additional painting for track. I would put down the track and then paint or just get pre-weathered track. As others stated, putting track is a challenge once pre-weathered with adding feeders. Remove some of the paint before adding feeder wires.
I paint the feeder wires a rust color after soldered to the stripped paint area for two reasons: 1. seeing some rust is realistic on a railroad and 2. that makes finding the wires easier.
One thing to consider with Micro Engineering “weathered” rail is that it’s just a metal blackener treatment, and it’s main benefit is that chips in the final paint job won’t be as visible. ME weathered track still looks plasticky and toylike without aditional paint and weathering because the ties are still shiny plastic.
For flextrack, I lay the track first, then carefully spray it with Rustoleum dark red primer. When finished sraying and before it dries, I wipe off the top of the rails. When dry I paint the ties with a custom paint the local hardware store mixed for me. It looks like dark chocolate but has some brown tones also.
For hand laid track, I stain the ties dark walnut before installing them. The ties are then glued to the roadbed. I use ME weathered rail. To clean the rail ends, I put a wire wheel in a Dremal tool and clean the ends.
IIRC, Rob recommended Rustoleum dark brown camoflaug color for painting track/ties. I picked some up and do like it. At least out west, the track doesn’t have that red rusty look, more like a grayish brown look.