available materials with which to match.
How to turn craft paint into model paint
The first step in making your hob- by paint is to find something to put it in. Being fundamen- tally cheap, I have over the years saved every bottle of Flo- quil or Polly Scale
In Bulk Liquitex Flow-Aid prod- ucts make airbrushing with craft paint possible. The low price of these products makes painting economical.
I have finished, cleaning them out and reserving them for other uses. (You can buy empty bottles from Micro-Mark or Walthers. I imagine such bottles can be pur- chased at Michael’s or other craft stores as well.) You can use any clean, empty glass or plastic bot- tle you have available. The main criterion is that it can be tightly sealed.
Mixing Paint I use marks on the bottles to add the Flow-Aid to the pigments. The bottles are labeled as to color.
I make two marks on the bot- tle using a Sharpie (see below). One is placed just where the side of the bottle begins curving up to the neck, and the other mark is placed halfway between the first mark and the bottom of the bottle. I then add paint up to the first mark from the bottom. This is followed by airbrush medium up to the second, top mark. Finally, I add about 0.5 to 1 milliliter of Flow Aid using a common, drug- store eyedropper. Once all the components are in the bottle, I seal it, shake to mix, and then add a label listing what color it is sup- posed to be and what craft paint I made it from. Something I haven’t
been doing (and if this were a re- agent in my lab, I would do it auto- matically — funny how something you do routinely at work is com- pletely forgotten when at home) is to add the date it was mixed, so I know how old the paint is when I use it in the future.
So, how well does it work?
My initial impressions are that this formula is the equivalent of Polly Scale in consistency and coverage. The last photo of this article shows a Rivarossi tank car model I finished using Americana Lemon Yellow and Ebony (Lamp) Black. In my opinion, if I didn’t tell you I painted it with craft paint, you probably wouldn’t know. The craft paint did not obliter- ate the details. The photograph on page 41 shows the deck detail of a piggyback flatcar I kitbashed. Note how the grain detail I added to the boards on either side of the ACF hitch is easily visible. The Archer rivet detail is also visible, and the finish is smooth and even. The craft paint is also durable. I painted a scrap Pullman car side with Folk Art Italian Sage, let it dry for about four hours, masked with 3M Blue Painter’s Tape, and then over-coated with Americana Deep Midnight Blue. None of the gray lifted off. Again, all the fine detail cast into the side is visible, and I think it looks no different than if I had sprayed it with Polly Scale.
How to use craft paints for modeling Once you have made your di- luted craft paint, it can be used
the same way as you would Pol- ly Scale. The paint brushes well right out of the bottle, with good coverage and opacity. The applica- tion levels quickly, and dries with- out obvious brush marks. For airbrushing, I use a Paas- che VL or H with a No. 3 tip and 20 pounds pressure. I add paint to the airbrush’s paint cup, and then add in some of the airbrush medium to further dilute the paint, mixing it by putting my fin- ger over the needle and blowing back. I vary the amount of air- brush medium I add, depending on the “feel” of the paint’s viscos- ity, up to 50 percent additional di- lution. This is the same technique I had been using with Polly Scale. If you are familiar with spraying acrylics with an airbrush, then whatever techniques you have been using should work, with maybe some tweaking as you be- come familiar with how the dilut- ed craft paint handles. I use hot, soapy water for cleaning out the airbrush when changing colors. If I want to change from acrylic to a solvent-based paint, I clean with the hot soapy water, denatured al- cohol, and then lacquer thinner. If I need to go back from a solvent- based paint to acrylic, then I go in reverse order. At the end of my paint session, I take my airbrush apart and clean it thoroughly with lacquer thinner. To airbrush weather my roll- ing stock, I dilute Polly Scale with rubbing alcohol. The craft paint, once diluted with airbrush medi- um and Flow-Aid works the same as the Polly Scale. Try 80 drops of the diluted craft paint into one ounce of 70 percent rubbing al-
40 RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN
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