Requesting a little help here.
We've all heard the saying paint yourself into a corner. Personally I don't know of anyone that has really done that. Painting the floor you paint your way out the door.
I got a kind of laugh about it. After I built this bridge I kind of realized I may have built myself into a corner.
How am I going to paint the inside this bridge, with a brush? I can't see reaching in there with an airbrush. I don't think it'll fit. If I have to paint the inside of it with a small brush it's going to take awhile.
If so what kind of paint should I use to do that. I really don't know. And is there a company that has a brush paint with a matching rattle can paint.... Thanks for any advice you can give in advance.
Size comparison
Tamiya's paints in spray cans and bottles match very well with one another.
.
I have experience with this having painted TONS of military miniatures.
Paint the inside using thinned paints and a relatively large (#5 or bigger) round brush intended ro watercolors. I prefer natural sable, but that is up to you. If you can find one, the Citadel "Tank Brush" is excellent. It does not have a tank, it is intended to use for painting large vehicles like tanks.
Go ahead and make a mess of the inside. Trying to be careful there is needless and tedious.
Then shoot the outside with the Tamiya can, should be good.
NOTE: Do not thin Tamiya paints with water. They are water soluable, but their thinner is the correct product to use. The paint will film over and dry way to quickly if you use water to thin it.
If you can find a bottle of Delta Ceramcoat "Extender", that will help too.
Good luck.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
The tip of an airbrush will fit, you don't have to get the whole airbrush inside. It's not like there aren't enough openings everywhere.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
First, do you have and/or use an airbrush? Easier to control the application rate compared to a rattle can. And yes, Tamiya model paint is one of the best. Using an airbrush allows you to use thinned-out acrylic paints.
Turn the bridge upside down and spray the underside and innermost surfaces first. Hanging the structure from the ceiling on a fish hook and line is a good way to get these hard to reach areas.
Holding the nozzle steady and very close will allow you to spray through the beams and whatnot, but you have to be very careful that the spray does not hit the near surfaces or else the paint will go on too thick and form pretty ugly runs that will have to be dealt with. And on the flip side, be cognizant of the overspray that could form a dusty finish on the far surfaces.
Otherwise, good luck.
Robert
LINK to SNSR Blog
I haven't done too much airbrushing but feel confident enough that I would be quite successful painting that with one. You may use a little more paint than usual but that's the cost of doing business.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
Thanks for the replies. All is helpful. I am going to have to decide which route of attack to use but at least I don't feel like it's so hopeless anymore.
I do have a brand new air brush.... it's never been used.... therefore no experience. I have a small unit that hooks up to my construction donut compressor with a water filter on it that can be adjusted to low pressures.
I guess I'm going to have to dust this stuff off and practice with it. The airbrush isn't even unwrapped out of the package yet. Any pointers on using this new toy would be helpful as well.
Thanks
I have done something like this before, the tip of the air brush will fit into the upright openings. Just angle it around to paint the far side. Do the inside before you spray the outside beams, less messy that way. The spray is directional, so you may have to fiddle around a bit to get coverage on the inside of the beams.
If you have not used an air brush or much spray cans before, practice on some scrap cardboard or stiff paper, like a cereal box before doing the model.
George In Midcoast Maine, 'bout halfway up the Rockland branch
I will also recommend Tamiya paints it will airbrush well and is a very good paint for brush painting also.
Modeling B&O- Chessie Bob K. www.ssmrc.org
I would use an air-brush..........
This entire scratch/bash bridge was painted with an air-brush with Tamiya acrylics, including trackwork and tower:
It was extremely helpful in the Lattice Girders, that you can see on top.....pic' may be clicked on for a larger view.
The tower also has a complete lighted interior:
Take Care!
Frank
Both of these...
...and this...
...and this one...
...and this one, too....
....were all built as one-piece removeable units. All were too big to paint in my spray booth, so I set-up the compressor outdoors, and airbrushed them, using either Floquil or Pollyscale paints.While they were a bit unwieldy to handle, the airbrush got the paint everywhere that it was needed.For the last set of spans shown, the superstructure of the truss bridge is removeable, which helped somewhat, especially for cleaning the paint off the rails afterward.
Wayne
Practice with your airbrush, get comfortable with it, then paint the bridge.
You'll find the airbrush is much easier to control than a spray can, and you'll easily be able to cover all the areas of your bridge.
The two tips for airbrush use - thin your paint, unless it's airbrush ready. Vallejo Air sprays nicely right from the bottle.
Tamiya arylics, on the other hand, need to be thinned about 50-50. You can use alcohol, but you'll get better results with their thinner.
The second is air pressure. Check the manufacturer for recommendations, or look elsewhere online if the paint doesn't indicate a pressure range.
Third - don't make changes to thinning ratio and air pressure at the same time. Keep notes and write down what works for next time.
Eric
I really appreciate all the feedback. It will be very helpful as I have four bridges to paint.
Frank great job on that lift bridge. I don't know what you used for those counterweights but they sure look good.
Bob I see you also recommend Tamiya paint.... I'm sold.
George some great advice, I know the saying practice makes perfect.
Wayne I never get tired of looking at your work. As you probably have gathered I love Bridges and you sure have some spectacular ones.
If you don't mind me asking, I know you made your water from Dura bond from our conversation before but what colors did you use for the water.... and a curiosity question how do you make your Bridges removable after the track is laid?
Eric some more great advice. I see you stand with others as Tamiya is the paint to use.
Tamiya it is....
Track fiddler...what colors did you use for the water....
The brown portion of the water was done with ColourPlace interior satin latex paint, from Walmart. I simply asked the salesperson for some dirt-coloured paint, and selected it from a chart of colour swatches. It's called "Thatched Cottage", but is likely no longer available, at least under that name. If you'd like the paint info and tint additive data, send me a PM, as I'm sure that it can still be mixed on request.I intended to use it to colour all of the Durabond-on-screen landforms, as I was suffering from indoor snow blindness every time I turned on all of the overhead fluorescent lighting, but found it very difficult to spread, and it also used an inordinate amount of paint. To solve that issue, I dumped some of the paint into another container, then filled it with tap water. The resultant stain/wash went on much more easily, and went a lot further, too. It can be seen in the first two photos in my previous post.I still have about a half-gallon of the unthinned paint left. The brown portions of the water used the full-strength (undiluted) paint, applied with a 2" brush.The grey-green areas representing deeper water were done using Glidden interior flat latex paint, from Home Depot - not sure if that brand is available in the U.S., but you could probably get a similar colour in any brand with the base and tint data. It was also applied full-strength in the same manner, and I also used it, with a brush, to colour some of the background trees/bushes, made from pieces of upholstery foam, that can be seen in the third photo.
Track fiddler...how do you make your Bridges removable after the track is laid?...
The fourth photo in my previous post probably illustrates it best: as you can see, the bridge track, with its closely-spaced ties, extends a bit beyond both ends of the bridge. The rail joiners connecting it on both rails and at both ends of the bridges, are the only ones on the layout not soldered in place. To remove a bridge, I use a small screwdriver or the tip of an X-Acto blade to slide the joiners away from the bridge, then lift it out. This is the procedure for the bridges shown in photos three and four, and the lower bridge in photo one, as they simply sit on their respective piers and abutments, although there are alignment keys built into both the bridges and their supports. All bridges also have a length of solid copper wire feeder on each rail, located near one end and extending straight down through the cork and plywood sub-roadbed. I added them just in case the sliding rail joiners proved insufficient, but they've not yet needed to be connected to the fixed-track. If they ever do prove needed, I'll solder a short length of flexible wire to connect them to matching wires from the land-based rails, and simply unsolder them if the bridge needs to be taken out.
The two high bridges, in photos one and two, are mounted on piano-wire pins imbedded in their footings, built-up from stacked pieces of .060" thick sheet styrene. I made a mistake in not providing levelled areas for each support tower, so the individual legs of each are on footings at various heights - this complicated tower and pier construction. I hope to disguise this for the high bridge in the first photo, using lots of trees and bushes, as has been done for the bridge in the second photo.Here's that bridge with scenery installation underway...
These views show the bridge removed and the pins visible in the tops of the support footings...
...and the bridge back in service...
This photo, below, shows the lower bridge from photo one, removed and set to the side. Visible in the tops of the cast Durabond piers are the aligment depressions, which match plates of styrene cemented to the bottoms of the "steel" supports at the ends of each individual span, also visible if you look closely. Also visible, at the tunnel mouth, is one of the heavy vertical feeder wires should the rail joiner connections ever become unreliable...
Here's one of the support footings for the high bridge from photo one...
...the steel pin inserts into a hole in a styrene plate cemented to the base of the tower's support leg.
A couple of water scenes from the time before the flood...
Looks good Wayne.
To be honest with you I think those footings on uneven ground look better then the under bridge grades that are tapered level. Sometimes it starts to look like stairs, not that there's anything wrong with that. For me I just like the uneven look better. I know those bridge supports must have been harder to fit to the footings. I think it was worth your efforts. I wouldn't try to hide that with bushes.... looks good.
I just want to thank you for sharing your information with me. Removable bridges is really going to help me out. I was apprehensive about laying track anytime soon because I wanted to get the scenery done below the bridges before I put them in.
With my forth Bridge finishing up here real soon and making them removable. I will be able to lay a twice around track and finally start to see some trains roll. That would be nice after two years.
I can appreciate the last two pictures you posted. Way different than your other river scene. Murky water looks like Mississippi Mud.
Now you're probably going to laugh. But let me explain something first. I'm the kind of guy that's out in the field working all the time dealing with customers. Not till a year-and-a-half ago I still had a flip phone. Computer what's that? ....my wife handles the office.
So I asked my wife what's a p.m. She says "what" ....don't you go to your personal site. I said what's that. She says give me your phone. She shows me. There's unopened messages that go back over a year...... so tonight I'll try this p.m. stuff first hand.
Thanks Wayne
Hello all.
Since I'm going to be firing up my new airbrush soon. I have another question.
I am modeling the transitional era. What were the prototypical bridge colors you would see at that time? I'm sure black and silver is always a given. What other colors would you typically see.
I think this is a legitimate question. I don't want to paint a bridge that's too modern of the color for that time. I like variety so it would be nice to have some good choices.
Track fiddlerFrank great job on that lift bridge. I don't know what you used for those counterweights but they sure look good.
Track fiddler,
Thanks for Your kind words.
As for the counter weights....they are made from #2 pine wood...3-pieces each to be exact. Shaped to slide in from the end and rest on the girders....they are not interchangeable......must go on correct side. The cuts were made with a Zona wood saw for concrete block squares and the frame work to hold them in place I used 1/8'' angle from Plastruct, 1/8'' Lattice Truss Girder, also 1/16'' C-channel. Most all the parts associated with the bridge were made to come apart and be reassembled at sight it was made for. It cannot be put in place whole......not enough room. Actually those counter weights were supposed to be taller/bigger on actual bridge......but I had to vertically compress overall height to fit in space and still make it look right. It don't look perfect.......but It will work...LOL:
Painting the structure with an air-brush was invalueable......practice with Yours, You will never regret it........