Model Train Journal

Fellow O’s,
I am about to embark on some passenger car build and paint. I plan to paint some classic schemes involving multi color and striping of the steam to diesel era in both heavy and light weight cars (think Missouri Pacific Eagle colors, and GM&O Alton Ltd two tone red/maroon with plenty of striping separating the colors).
Can you share experience with masking and painting stripes versus decaling the stripes?
Seems there would be lots of 1) layering and masking/re-masking if painting and the opportunity for bleeding under the masking tape. Also, the multi paint layers may build up thick and start to hide rivets and panel lines. Decals always appear to be translucent in colors like yellow, silver, dulux gold and white, unless you “double decal” the stripes. Anyone try to hand stripe with a flex nib, technical pen or liner brush (realizing it requires a super steady hand and draftsman ruler)?
Recommendations for paint? I am steering towards Tru-Color (realizing that Floquil is old and sparse)
Recommendations for masking versus decaling (if decaling - whose product is best?)

Thanks!

This one is going to have a lot of variety, as everyone has their favourite techniques.

Trucolor is good stuff. It likes a tooth (a grit-blasted surface or a good primer) and surface cleanliness is required.

I like Mr Hobby primers, something I got from the plastic modeller crowd.

Trucolor is delightfully thin when airbrushed, so multiples don't kill detail. Thickness of coat and bleeding under tape come with the loss of control with rattlecans. I personally won't use them.

I use Tamiya striping tapes, again from the plastic modeller crowd. They come in multiple widths and do curves nicely.

Go to the IPMS/plastic modeller shows with eyes and ears open. Get hooked in with them. They have techniques, tools, and materials we have no idea exists.

For areas, the purple masking tape does well, but it's thick stuff. Cut it with a sharp knife, scalpel, or suture scissors. Bluemask is a bit more aggressive but conforms to surfaces tighter.

Shoot paint across the tape, not into it. Bleeds a lot less that way.

I have done a lot of lining with rules and bow-pens. Good ones are a joy and cheap ones a frustration. I also have a good set of lettering brushes. It's an acquired skill and a frustrating one until you get the hang of it. Even now I'm not that good at it.

If you want to learn about lining with pens and paints, this book is the best guide out there. It's worth getting and reading just for tips and techniques.



Ian is probably the best there is at this skill. You'll need to practice on scrap sheet and old cheap HO shells bought as junk from the train shows, and it is a craft onto itself.

Otherwise, decals are your friend. Doubling up decals for opaqueness is going to be your life. It's the price we pay for thin transfers in modern inks.

Sight down stripes at a shallow angle to get them straight rather than think they are by looking down at the surface at a right angle.

Shoot light colours first, masking for successively dark ones, whenever you can.

Buy a bunch of junk shells and practice, practice, practice.

My best stripes were done with those fine line pens you get at the stationery store. I seem to gravitate to cars with Dulux, gold, or silver stripes. I always stripe with white first.

My only experience with good paint has been Scale Coat. Let it dry for a week prior to striping.

Use a straightedge with several layers of masking tape underneath to avoid capilla ry action between stripe paint, body, and straightedge.

Examples are in my passenger car thread.

Go here - check out the Walthers Louisville and Nashville car on the first page.

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=19305&hilit=passenger+cars

sarge wrote:This one is going to have a lot of variety, as everyone has their favourite techniques.

Trucolor is good stuff. It likes a tooth (a grit-blasted surface or a good primer) and surface cleanliness is required.

I like Mr Hobby primers, something I got from the plastic modeller crowd.

Trucolor is delightfully thin when airbrushed, so multiples don't kill detail. Thickness of coat and bleeding under tape come with the loss of control with rattlecans. I personally won't use them.

I use Tamiya striping tapes, again from the plastic modeller crowd. They come in multiple widths and do curves nicely.

Go to the IPMS/plastic modeller shows with eyes and ears open. Get hooked in with them. They have techniques, tools, and materials we have no idea exists.

For areas, the purple masking tape does well, but it's thick stuff. Cut it with a sharp knife, scalpel, or suture scissors. Bluemask is a bit more aggressive but conforms to surfaces tighter.

Shoot paint across the tape, not into it. Bleeds a lot less that way.

I have done a lot of lining with rules and bow-pens. Good ones are a joy and cheap ones a frustration. I also have a good set of lettering brushes. It's an acquired skill and a frustrating one until you get the hang of it. Even now I'm not that good at it.

If you want to learn about lining with pens and paints, this book is the best guide out there. It's worth getting and reading just for tips and techniques.



Ian is probably the best there is at this skill. You'll need to practice on scrap sheet and old cheap HO shells bought as junk from the train shows, and it is a craft onto itself.

Otherwise, decals are your friend. Doubling up decals for opaqueness is going to be your life. It's the price we pay for thin transfers in modern inks.

Sight down stripes at a shallow angle to get them straight rather than think they are by looking down at the surface at a right angle.

Shoot light colours first, masking for successively dark ones, whenever you can.

Buy a bunch of junk shells and practice, practice, practice.

I had been toying with idea of hand striping. I have drawn with permanent black inks and done lettering and realize you get “one shot” which comes from practice and patience.
The elegance and complexity of British steam far exceeds anything I would attempt other than straight lines in different thicknesses.
The book you indicate is hard to locate at a reasonable price right now, BUT…I did find Mr. Ian Rathbone’s paint series here..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZukygkIe54

Great tips, thanks.

Try Abebooks at www.abebooks.com (used to be American Book Exchange). A copy can be had for under $50.

sarge wrote:Try Abebooks at http://www.abebooks.com (used to be American Book Exchange). A copy can be had for under $50.

Excellent. thanks for the link. If I could only peel myself away from the Mr. Rathbone’s videos I would get to ordering it immediately. His artistry is exemplary. I have several modeling books from across the pond, but mainly dealing with other subjects other than paint.
I have several Walthers “tinplate” O car sides from their classic kits which will make excellent practice canvases. Also think some Lionel 18” heavyweights will feel the wrath…not ashamed that at a low point I acquired them. Slip of judgement…

Any thoughts on how to do raised edges? - as in the lower window rail (on Walthers cars it is rounded from stamping) and on American standard kits it is a two level riveted rail. I can imagine that does not make ruling lines easy. These may require masking.

I'd mask them and airbrush.

One piece of advice I got from the guy who taught me the custom-painting game:

"Any idiot can learn to paint. A craftsman knows how not to paint."

In other words, the craftsmanship is in the masking, not the squirting.

My personal preference is to decal rather than mask off stripes, I find the time and steps required for masking considerable and (again opinion) getting the desired results can be far more tedious than decals.
Not that decals don't have their own tedium/drawbacks as have already been pointed out here but over the years the improvement in paint and decal medium quality and air-brushing has flipped the ratio of applying stripes via masking versus decaling to where I'll only mask stripes if the appropriate color/composition is not available, the surface to be stripped is too irregular or the stripe itself is too complex or sharply curved or angled to apply cleanly as a decal. Striping certain hood diesel frame stripes comes to mind where you have a lot of stanchion "bumps," fill plugs, etc.
Regarding the tedium of applying a straight car length stripe onto a letterboard edge, belt rail or frame rail I will scribe a very thin line using a straight edge and mechanical pencil or metal stylus as a guide if the carbody surface itself doesn't present a raised rail, edge or obvious seam. Where you're pin striping a two-tone carbody (say IC, NYC or B&O) scheme your masking off anyway, a clean and straight masking process is a must and I must say my technique on that improved significantly with the process steps I learned from Sarge over the past decade and as he's described here. Appropos to his IPMS comments I've had very good results using the Tamiya orange masking tape typically found in the plastic model supply aisle at Hobby Lobby, such that I've discontinued using the 3M products for edge masking.

De Bruin wrote:........the Tamiya orange masking tape typically found in the plastic model supply aisle at Hobby Lobby.....

I shall have to invest in some......now to find a Hobby Lobby preferably before Sat.

Thanks to your recommendation, I devoured the dozen or so reels on the ‘tube by Ian Rathbone. The first several were familiar themes on airbrushing, cleaning brass and paint booths, but after then it was magic, seeing the actual techniques for precise striping with curved and ornate corner flairs. Hungry for more (and the paper - yes I am one of those sorts that still enjoys printed matter) I ordered the book from abebooks from England, paying shipping and tariff. It is marvelous and carefully summarizes the videos while adding clear reference pictures.
While I will never undertake something as complex as triple (and shaded) pin striping on a British prototype engine, i will do up some test cars in GM&O, Pennsy and of course, MoPac/T&P Eagle colors to practice - plenty of striping there.
I placed an order with Martin Cohen of Tru-scale paints and he offered to mix up a test batch of paint for use with a drafting ink (K&E style) pen. In chatting with him I sadly heard that Dan Pantera had passed, who has several featured models on Tru-scales page showing example models. I had met Dan years ago and always marveled at whatever passenger cars he had hauled to that show. A great guy,

Sounds like a great plan and we look forward to seeing the results (both good and bad). A lot of us here haven't painted and seeing someone else go through the steps would be encouraging.

Of that selection I only have PRR to offer. I have striped GN and L&N cars the same way, and a number of doorstop Diesels as well.

Technique (again) is to use those fine line pens and a good straightedge, with a joggle created with masking tape to avoid capillary action under the straightedge. Wait a week after painting, so the pens do not scrape at the finish and get clogged. Then white, followed by your finish color.

PRR - not the complicated two-tone Tuscan scheme, but the same technique would apply. Curves can be done with old credit cards cut to shape.



L&N - Walthers car, Scalecoat:

In chatting with him I sadly heard that Dan Pantera had passed

I just reread your post and missed the part about Dan. I hadn't heard that and will do some research. Dan came through a life threatening 100+ day hospital stay due to infection from a fairly common procedure, but that was a couple of years ago. I wonder if there is confusion with this gentleman.

According to discussions within the OScale2RailProto48Modelers group, a member named Dan Pantera (from Wiltshire, England) died from a heart attack at the Johnstown, PA Hospital

I had not read that Dan Pantera, Calumet Model Works, had passed, but that is really sad if so.

A modern day Joe Fischer.

Really wish there were more articles or even just a photo essay of his process, and resulting models. Curious if he catalogued everything he built.

I had asked him to possibly build me some stuff, but he already probably had a multi-decade backlog at that point. Fortunately, Scott and Jay have or are planning to make all of the Varnish that I wanted for my pike, outside of a few head-end cars.