Ideally you would not want to handle the just-painted item, so that means letting all the paint dry. If so, you then have to figure out how to clean the rail head efficiently.
As just stated, quite a few fellas put a light film of cooking oil or something like it atop their rails and then spray. Later, the top can be simply wiped clean, including with a light solvent or alcohol to remove the oil residuals.
I am fairly certain that a light sanding with 600-800 grit sandpaper will clean the dried stuff up fairly easily, although it may scour up the rail surface a bit. Personally, I don't care and use sandpaper to clean my rails on the rare occasion is seems to suggest that it needs cleaning. We're not talking scrubbing here, just a light rub back and forth. I think you might find that a Bright Boy, and ink eraser, and mayb even a piece of wood will do a fair job until you can use something to finish up.
question: just finished reading the new MR, and they h ad a bit about weathering the track for the new project layout, the Wisconsin Southern or whatever. They showed a picture of them airbrushing the track... but said nothing about cleaning it off. Very misleading. Newbies like me would take it that you dont have to do that... just paint and go.
do you guys have any weathering methods that DONT require an airbrush? I really dont want to invest in something for a 4x8 that'll get taken down in 6 years or so (most likely) and I'm not sure I want to get the ME weathered flex track anymore (i want more rust-color opportunities, or can you also weather the pre-weathered track to give it different colors?) I know someone before mentioned using a q-tip with the ME weathering solution. Anyone have experience with that, or using a different weathering product with q-tips? Basically im trying to find info on ways to weather track and give it that sweet rusted look like on Bill Grubers Reading Line from the... March 94 MR (month might be wrong). I have never seen anyone with as slick-looking weathered rail as his. Theres one picture in the article of a yard, and the track is just PERFECT looking.
I do all my weathering painting by hand. Takes almost no time at all, certainly three or four times as fast as ballasting. I use Poly Scale "railroad tie brown" for the mains and yard trackage, and Floquil "rust" for the sidings and spurs.
I've tried everything I think, and here is what works for me. I don't have an airbrush, so I use Floquil spray paints to weather track. I use rail brown first, spray well from the front side to get the sides of the rails and again from straight above to cover all the ties. I then dust with an uneven coat of grimy black to tone down the brown a bit. I work in sections of 1-2 feet at a time so I can then wipe of the rail heads with a soft cloth wrapped tightly around my finger. If you do this lightly while the paint is wet you will get 95% of the paint off without touching any of the ties or messing up the paint. This whole process takes 5 mins tops to do a section of 1-2 feet. Then, when all is dry I polish he railheads to remove any remaining paint with 600 grit sandpaper. Finally, I highlight the spike heads and tie plate details with a fine (000) brush using a mixture of acrylic Poly Scale--9 parts rust to 1 part grimy black. The results for me are great, and I'm pretty picky about the look of my track. You may want to add more rusty highlights to seldom used sidings as well.
Ron
Owner and superintendant of the N scale Texas Colorado & Western Railway, a protolanced representaion of the BNSF from Fort Worth, TX through Wichita Falls TX and into Colorado.
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I"ve never tried the oil-the-rails solution.
I just paint (usually with spray cans) and clean the top of the rail later with a Brite boy. Works great.
I brush paint my track. Working in about 1 foot sections, I paint both sides of the rail, the wipe the paint of the railhead before it dries. I use Polly S Zinc Chromate Primer for the mains and DRG&W Freight Car Brown for the auxilery tracks. Also, I use the same color for the ties and rail.
Nick
Take a Ride on the Reading with the: Reading Company Technical & Historical Society http://www.readingrailroad.org/
loathar wrote:Deadhead-You don't have to use an airbrush. I use Krylon Camouflage brown and Rustoleum flat brown spray cans. I spray the track brown. Do my ballasting. And then follow up with brush painting some rust colored paint on the sides of the rails and using some ground up pastel chalks to weather it.You do need to clean the rail heads off for electric contact.
Good advice from "loathar." A few additions of my own. I use spray cans and do my track painting outside, rather than 'in place.' I also use track that holds a curve because otherwise shiny spots show up when you curve prepainted track. Atlas flex does not hold a curve.
Here are the spray paints I use. From the hardware store: Krylon Camouflage "Ultra - Flat" 4293 "Olive" (very similar to Floquil grimy black), 8141 Khaki (good for spots where poor drainage has thrown mud up on the rails and ties), 8141 Brown (a good basic color for track).
Ace Hardware1037605 Red Oxide Primer (for highlights and rusted track such as leading into a scrap yard or steel mill).
Rust-Oleum214085 Flat Brown (another good basic track color).
As you can see loathar and I like some of the same colors.
Also for small highlights and very isolated dirty muddy areas I use some Tamiya spray paints from the hobby shop AS-15 USAF Tan, TS-68 Wooden Deck Tan, AS16 USAF Light Gray. I also use those Tamiya paints for doing sidewalks and roads so they have many uses. Too bad they are so pricey.
When spraying I usually have three or more cans ready at once and vary between them so that there is never one solid color but a blended mix. I spray with both hands so that wet spray from two colors actually mixes in air before hitting the track. With practice you can get this down to a fine effect. But the main goal is to weather all the rail and not miss any spots.
If I get it wrong and some spots or color do not look realistic, I also have a spritz bottle with a mix of rubbing alcohol and india ink. That is a very good unifier and has the advantage that it can be done "in place" after the ballasting and final installation are all complete. It has the side benefit of also making any of the weathering chalks that Loathar refers to stick better.
I do lightly oil the top of the rail (a drop of oil on a Q tip does a whole 3 ft piece of flex track) and wipe off the rail head with a rag on a block of wood after painting. I model a main line where the railhead was shiny. You can scrape the paint off too but oiling it first makes this so easy that I now prefer it.
When spray painting flex track outside I put rail joiners on all ends of rail so that those spots will remain bare metal for electrical contact. Since paint gets inside the rail joiners I have some that I use only for painting.
I contructed out of foam core (picked up a ton, with permission, from signs at work that were being thrown away) a sort of "bleachers" so that I can paint many pieces of flex track at once and carry them all inside at once after painting. I also created one that matches my standard curves. But a flat surface is fine too. I think it helps to have it elevated rather than on the ground so often I use our garbage cans, covered with an old sheet, on the driveway.
Don't forget to shake the cans thoroughly. And by that I mean no less than a minute, and preferably three minutes, per can. And yes afterwards hold the cans upside down to clean the nozzles. The paint you "waste" is nothing compared to having the whole can gum up and be worthless.
I also have the Testor/Floquil F3801 set of three "paint sticks" with Track Colors: Rail Brown, Rail/Tie Brown, and Rust. These are good for touch ups, missed spots, and tight areas as well as rail joiners. I use them also on turnouts and I also use the Micro Engineering patina fluid for turnouts to avoid painting a point shut or creating an insulated spot where points meet rails.
The set F3803 Earth Tones is good for the muddy spots (earth, mud, and grime).
In a VERY well ventilated basement it might be possible to construct a sort of canyon maybe using cardboard or foam core so that spray cans can be used indoors on site without getting spray paint where you do not want it. I prefer not to have those fumes in the house if I can help it.
I do have an airbrush by the way but I want to use it ONLY where I have my paint booth and except maybe for painting turnouts, a paint booth is just not useful for painting track.
Dave Nelson
I'm just now getting ready to paint rails. I've been putting it off but now need to get it done. All my track is laid, much scenery is in place, and I've now started adding ballast to my Atlas True Track plastic road bed.
So, I just ordered a Rusty Rails Painter. I hope that that this works as it should make the job much easier and faster. If it doesn't, I'll just have to brush it on which sounds a bit tedious.
Here is the website for the Rusty Rails Painter: http://www.joesmodeltrains.com/Rusty%20Rails%20Painter.htm
Jerry
Rio Grande vs. Santa Fe.....the battle is over but the glory remains!