Curious about painting a steam locomotive.......

[herronpeter]

......and how you painters out there handle painting the smoke box silver. Do you paint the whole thing black first then mask the boiler, running boards and in my case the air pump and then spray the silver? What about the handrails and stanchions, head light and stack? Do you hand paint the silver? Do you spray the silver first then mask the round part of the smoke box and stack and shoot the black? No matter which way I look at it, I cannot figure out the easiest way to do it.

Thanks,

Peter

[bob turner]

Easiest is a brush. The real thing sort of looks brushed on- I think they swabbed it on with a rag while the thing was hot. If you want to spray, you already outlined the easiest way.
Opinion.

[prrjim]

I sort of have a rule of thumb to paint the smallest batch of color first. This requires the least masking.

So on a steamer, I spray the silver or grey on the smokebox first. then I mask it and spray the rest of the boiler. If there are things on the smokebox that are very hard to mask around and small, I just go back later and brush paint them. The small number plates on the front of PRR freight steamers are an example. I also use a brass wire wheel to polish the builder plate, then brush on some clearcoat before I paint. Then I mask it before any thing else and cut carefully around with a hobby knife. I leave the mask on it until all done. Same with the whistle and bell, although sometimes it is easier to just remove the bell from the bracket until done.

On a separate part of this, I have not taken mechanism apart. If the frames and drivers need to painted, I mask the tire threads, the gearbox, motor and anything else I don't want to dirty with paint and then spray the mechanism. I try leave the drive shaft free so I can manually turn it to get behind the rods. Speaking of rods, lately I have been handpaint wheels and using Neo-lube on the rods and sides of the tires. Neo-Lube is an alcohol-graphitet lubricant that is opaque black and it says is conductive. BTS models sells/sold it and so does micromark. It is not solid black, but sort of opaque flat black. to me it makes shiny silver stuff look like clean polished steel, slight grey. I do this wth a small brush.
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By the way masking on the tires if you do it and around the smoke box requires cutting many small pieces of tape, Remember the tape can overlap, so all measurements can be eyeball and the tape just overlaid or pulled under handrails etc.

[bob turner]

I too spray mechanisms after assembly. It is the proper way for a fairly lazy modeler on his way to the airport.

But I get best results by stripping the frame, coating it and cylinder block with baked on Scalecoat, then assembling for final paint.

My final paint used to be Floquil, shot on with mechanism slowly running with only the tiniest amount of lubrication. Then, while still running, I Q-Tip the driver tires with acetone, removing residual paint. Then I let it run for five more minutes.

I do it right side up and inverted, to get the inside of the drivers. Takes ten minutes, not counting making the airbrush work.

Sounds slipshod, but I win prizes.

[herronpeter]

Thank you Bob Turner and PRRJIM. I ended up shooting the whole boiler black (50% grimy black, 50% engine black Model Master) as I didn’t like the "graphite" I brought with me. (1 month "snowbird trip" to Florida-not the best time to do it!). I’ll deal with the graphite now that I am home.

I hand painted the drivers and leading and trailing truck wheels. I hand painted all the rods and associated running gear Tamiya "gunmetal" which is a darkish grey. I always do the weathering with the engine running slowly like you guys do.

Everything turned out pretty good for me. I usually have problems airbrushing, why I don’t know.

I’ll post a couple of pics when I get it all together again.

Thanks for taking the time to reply.

Best,

Peter