wood buildings

[snowey]

I've heard that spraying wwith Dullcoat these before assembly will prevent warping. Anyone heard of this? Do you spray 1 side, or both sides?

[Anonymous]

you need to spray both sides at the same time ideally.

I've not had many problems with warping but maybe i'm lucky. Spraying with varnish means that you can't use normal wood glue

you could try using normal paints ot paint the walls on both sides before you put the structure together. This might help.

see what other people say too.

neil

[mls1621]

I model in N scale and have built seven Laser Kit structures for my layout so far.

I've brush painted some and sprayed others. Brush painting seems to cause more warpage than spray, but if you paint both sides of the wall, the wood expands evenly to minimized the effect.

Spraying has given the best results for me. I used double stick tape to hold the wall panels flat on a piece of 1/4" plywood and apply light coats. Allow 30 minutes between coats and repeat till the desired coverage is achieved. When the paint has fully cured, t carefully remove the walls from the tape. When initially applying the tape to the base, I fold an end under to ease removal. Lift the tape away from the base, then turn the wall face down and peel the tape form the back.

I've experienced minimal warping using this method. Light sanding with very fine grit paper while still on the base board gives good weathering effects.

Paint all the trim pieces and window frames before removing them from the sheets. They are a more rigid wood than the walls, so brush painting these parts is fine.

One other tip that has really simplified assembly for me. Assemble the windows and doors completely before installing them in the structure walls, then assemble the structure. It's much easier to get a good adheision of the door and window frames to the walls when they're laying flat on the work bench.

I hope this is helpful.

[orsonroy]

Spraying a wood kit with dullcote (or even gloss) is a decent, fast way of sealing the wood, so it doesn't warp when you paint the outside. The process only takes a few seconds, the dullcote drys completely in an hour or less, and it's simple to do.

I've built something like ten AMB caboose kits and five structures, and I always seal the wood (all sides, two even coats) with dullcote first. Better safe than sorry!

[Anonymous]

I do considerable work in wood. My practice is to brace the panels and corners with scrap wood to stiffen the structure, then seal the wood with a nonwater base prime coat both inside and out.

Randy