Just finished painting all the rail on the layout. I rubbed the track down will a rag and some GooGone to give a clean surface to let the paint stick. Then I brush painted all the rail with Floquil Rust. One standard little bottle did the entire layout.
I painted all the turnout rail except the points. After a one day dry I got the paint off the railheads with 220 grit sand paper wrapped around a block of wood.
It looks good. The code 100 nickel silver looks smaller and more like a part of the land and less like bright shiny toy train track that might get picked up and put away at any time. Trains still run well (after cleaning) and all the turnouts still work. The paint runs onto the plastic ties but it runs into and emphasizes the woodgrain molded into the blact plastic Atlas flex track. All the rail gaps and feed wires blend in better after painting.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
It sounds like you are inviting me to view a picture of a job well done, but I don't get one! Thats like teasing a dog with a 12 oz. tbone...
J/K, a pic would be nice though, glad you got good results.
I'm glad that you painted your rails. The track always looks better that way.
But I am sorry that you cleaned the tops of the rails with sand paper. That tends to cause minute scratches that dirt gets into. Look for a post on polishing rails. (Do a search here) You may want to do that.
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.
Nagrom1 wrote:It sounds like you are inviting me to view a picture of a job well done, but I don't get one! Thats like teasing a dog with a 12 oz. tbone... J/K, a pic would be nice though, glad you got good results.
I would like to see a pic or 2 as well. This is my next project and I'm getting ideas for color variations. I have some rail I painted rail brown or rust, but it looked too red, when most rail where I am seems to be more of a more brown color. I can't get to any real rail without driving across town to get pics.
OhioRailroader wrote: I would like to see a pic or 2 as well. This is my next project and I'm getting ideas for color variations. I have some rail I painted rail brown or rust, but it looked too red, when most rail where I am seems to be more of a more brown color. I can't get to any real rail without driving across town to get pics.
Floquil or Polly's "Roof Brown" is just about the right color straight out of the bottle for most locations. If your RR is in a desert location with a light brown or tan dust blowing around, you might have to look for something else.
gandydancer19 wrote:Floquil or Polly's "Roof Brown" is just about the right color straight out of the bottle for most locations. If your RR is in a desert location with a light brown or tan dust blowing around, you might have to look for something else.
Thanks! I'll have to look in my paints to see if I have any. I bought a buch of colors a few years ago but don't remember what I have now lol.
A couple of examples:
Wayne
4x8 are fun too!!! RussellRail
I'll have to get a picture up, but I painted one of my turnouts with PollyS Tarnished Black, and I really liked the results. Granted theres no rusty color, but that can be easily applied later. I really like the look though. I just got a bottle of Grimy Black that I'm going to use on another turnout to see how that looks.
I had bought a Fast Tracks turnout painted with Weathered Black, and it looks horrible. Such a bad idea. Its too black. the Tarnished and Grimy Blacks have nice gray tints. I'm going to be experimenting with making a wash of rust/rail brown (which is what I used to get the color of the rails in the picture on my diorama) and painting that on over the Tarnished/Grimy Black. I also need to get a bottle of Roof Brown, which is what i forgot to pick up when I was at the LHS the other day. I'm also going to experiment with mixing roof brown/rust with tarnished/grimy black to see how that works out.
Rail Brown IS NOT brown. its more like... tan/olive drab. its weird. I don't like it. it needs accenting.
In this picture, the foreground turnout's ties and frog are painted with Rail Brown.
this picture gives you a better idea of what the rails look like. I first painted them with the Rail Brown, and then went back over them with Floquil's Rust marker. I guess you could have gotten the same color by just mixing the 2 together initially, but I didn't do that. It was either that, or I painted Rust first, and then went back over with Rail Brown while the paint was still wet. I did this a couple times until i got the look that I liked.
Does anyone have any pictures of rail painted with Roof Brown or Grimy Black or anything?
I don't recall whether this is Rail Brown or Roof Brown, or a mixture of the two:
In some places, especially turnouts, I sometimes add a bit of Oily Black.
Krylon Camoflauge brown spray paint with a bit of home made rust color brushed on.Rustoleum Flat brown spray paint with same rust.