I’m not familiar with the ME product which you mentioned, but it was a simple task to paint my rails with PollyScale paint using a fairly stiff 1/2" brush. I have just under 200’ of mainline, plus lots of passing sidings and industrial spurs. You don’t need to do the whole job in a single session. In fact, this is a task for those times when you have only 15 or 20 minutes available: paint 20’ of track or a couple of turnouts, re-seal the paint jar and clean out the brush, and you’re all set for the next time.
And even though my layout is an around-the-room type, I always paint both sides of all rails - you never know when you’ll want to take a photo with the camera placed on the layout and pointed towards the aisle. [swg]
Floquil makes a set of felt-tip marker pens loaded with paint in rusty weathering colors. I use them to simply paint the sides of the rails with Rail Brown. I then touch up the ties with the Railroad Tie Brown marker. It’s quick and easy.
I’ve used these markers to do about 125 feet of rail/ties. The work went quickly (a couple of hours total) and it looked good.
Keep in mind that you want to be sure that you have soldered all your feeders before you paint the rails, otherwise, you will have to remember to remove the paint before soldering to the rail.
You can add to the effect by using light gray ballast for the main line and a darker gray for the logging line. The main line would have a well groomed look, but the logging line would be less maintained with some weeds growing between the rails and in the ballast. You can also paint on a black or dark brown paint wash on the track and ballast. No airbrush needed.
I have also done it with a paint brush. With both methods I have found doing a coat of rust, followed by a coat of slate or brown has given me the look I was looking for. The second coat covers the rust coat leaving the rust colour to look like it is indeed leaching out from various bits such as spikes and tie plates etc. Plus it leaves just enough random rust spots to look good.
The layout you referenced in the latest Great Model Railroads has handlaid track, with what looks like Micro Engineering pre-weathered rail, which is basically plain rail treated with the same weathering solution you described. I don’t know many people who use that particular ME product, so I wouldn’t say it’s a “standard.” One thing the ME weathering solution is good for is to give rail a base color and some “tooth” to take subsequent layers of paint. Paint markers have been mentioned above, and they can be effective, but tend to give a translucent effect if used on shiny rail. Use the ME weathering (or another chemical blackener) to prepare the rail, or just apply a coat of paint from a spray can, airbrush or bristle brush. Finish the rail with a paint marker on top of such a base and you’ll avoid an unrealistically thin coat of weathering.
Feeders are the wires you solder on to the rails from the main DCC bus (If you are using DCC) to provide the power to the track. No power, no run trains.
The method I have come up with works great, block off the area beyonf the subroadbed with newspaper or whatever, use your choise of rattle can flat (mine is by Model Master). Let dry and wash the ties with your choice of weathering soloution (I use AI). Paint the rails with a rust (I use a liquid rust but any of the paint ways is fine to). Balast and weather the ballast , oil drips etc.
I’ve been using Joe Fugate weathering method, except that I prime the track with oxyde red primer in a rattle can. Then, using acrylic paints, I paint the ties to give them the right color with subtle variation to represent old and newer ties. Rails are touched up with a fine paintbrushed in the final desired color depending if it is a siding or a mainline. I do it before I do any scenicking around the track. It’s quite fast and priming the track before hand is more forgiving after.
Floquil makes a set of felt-tip marker pens loaded with paint in rusty weathering colors. I use them to simply paint the sides of the rails with Rail Brown. I then touch up the ties with the Railroad Tie Brown marker. It’s quick and easy.
The only problem I have with the Floquil markers is that you can’t buy just the one rail rust. They only come in a pack of three colors, which means the one marker costs $10 bucks. [|(]
