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Airbrushing for Newby’s.

40K views 61 replies 28 participants last post by  towie964 
#1 ·
Click this Link and download a 28mb paint mask + guide zip file full of tips on modelling, airbrushing, using stickers, paints, and a STACK of paint masks and logos (ie GM, ford, bmw etc) and more.


This is a collection of free files from about 5 different websites


After painting MY LST's body i received a few requests for various info via PM. I thought i'd put it all into one post as we have done with various other topics (including first rc buyers thread)


MY LST's new truck body thread <-- the body i painted for Jim / My LST


I am by no means anwhere near pro at this and still have a hell of a lot to learn also.. i would consider myself a veryexperienced newby (intermediate at best maybe?) You will see examples of my mistakes further down the page.


My equipment is budget price range but i also chose an airbrush which i knew i could get attachments for. This is one of the most important things, even for cheap airbrush kits.


I have not posted any pics of my $79, 2HP 25L air compressor as we have all seen these in just about every auto or bunnings store. These are perfect for airbrushing and cleaning your RC



A good friend in USA has the Badger 350 and as such I had been eyeing it offon tower for a while when i found this $30 airbrush kit at my LHS. I have also since seen it at another LHS without the air canister for $20. The LHStold me they cannot get accessories for it but i knew better



Air canisters are a waste of time and very expensive. Just buy an Air compressor and air comp to airbrush adaptor (it converts the small a/brush hose into a regular click on airline fitting)


Accessories like the colour cup and various air nozzles allow you more flexibility with your spray effect, even for a newby with a single action airbrush like myself.


Aint nothing worse than buying an airbrush and being VERY limited to what you can do. a mate has one which is terrible to use because you cannot change it from the huge jar and his tip blocks up repeatedly with almost no air/paint mixture adjustment.


Easy disassembly for cleaning is also important to Keep that gun spotlessly clean!


Badger 350 Airbrush parts + accessories.








Disassembled for Easy cleaning. you have to keep them spotless or you will get poor finish and a splattery effect caused by blockages.





As seen on tower hobbies, the Badger 350. The only difference is mine says "Airbrush" instead of "Badger" down the handle.





The Colour cup allows you to use smaller amounts of paint, which i find is a perfect amount for a single light coat over the entire body. It saves a lot of paint waste which occurs when you have to 1/4 fill a jar for a stripe. Heck, you need a decent amount of paint in a jar just for the feeder hose(from jar lid to bottom of jar)to be submerged and pickup paint.


Its also quick between colours, just use up the paint, unclip it from the airbrush and flush with water. within 15seconds its ready to go again, unlike jars.


I have to say after owning it for 6mth, it is the one i use most and i would NEVER buy another airbrush unless i could get one of these.. its a must have!


Badger 350 Colour Cup, one of my favourites.











I use the Parma Fas-paints as they are waterbased which makes for easy cleaning and they mix easily. White, black and silver are essentials for backing other light colours (ie: yellow) and for making other colours lighter/darker (ie:add whiteto dark blue if you want a lighter blue paint)


Parma FasPaints





Faskoat is used to protect your paint (seal it) when the job is finished and is also used to apply the fas-glitters (aka metallics). It MUST be used to seal the paint, otherwise nitro,metho + water will eat it off the body very quickly.


FasGlow is mixed with any paint to give a glow in the dark look.





Fas-glitters are mixed with the FasKoat and sprayed onto your body first, then backed in whatever colour you like.. This allows you to have gold glitter on a black body, or any combination (all the different coloured glitters mixed togetherand backed inblack look fantastic!)


FasGlitters/Metallics





No Slip matting, i think its meant for cupboard drawers etc? Ask bunnings for a sample and the peice they give you will last you years!



I laid this on the body, then sprayed faspearl black. removed the matt then sprayed charcoal and it gives a carbon fibre effect. Try the colours the other way around for a different C/F look.. I think a silvery grey?instead of the faspearl black will make it stand out more.








Olfa Circle Cutter ($15-$20) gives a perfect circle for wheel arches and cooling holes. This is much smarter than wobbly hand cut circles.





XXXMain picture glue will apply any printed matter to your body and can be painted over to make it look invisible. It looks a lot like white wood glue that dries clear to me? but what do i know.
Ive seen examples of soldiers (unreal tornament soldier) on a bonnet with a silvery white mist around as if it was rising out of the fog, very smart!


I steal those little avon makeup brushes from the wife to apply the glue, they are perfect size and disposable, and they are extremely cheap.


Ifyou haveit at home, Iwould suggest trying wood glue or school glues with printed pics on a coke bottle as a trial, it might work for you!


XXX Main, Lexan pic glue


Bob Divelys liquid mask, i have to water it down a little bit so it sprays on easily without blocking my gun. Mask up areas not to be mask because overspray of this stuff is hard to see + remove. It dries clear, allowing you to draw your desig outside the body, then follow the lines when cutting the mask on the inside.


Always allow this stuff to dry overnight, as you need a nice thick coat for it to peel easily.





Bob Dively liquid mask


Edited by: Oblivion
 
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#2 ·
ok, now to show you some of the MAJOR mistakes i made which made me very displeased with my own handywork. (i like to pick at my own mistakes so i dont make them again)


Hopefully some of you may learn the error of my ways and not repeat a few simple mistakes.


Here, i have printed + cut my flame design out of regular printer paper. I Laid it inside the body and used a texta to draw on the outside of the body (draw on the overspray film) NEVER EVER use texta inside a body because once you paint over it, you cannot remove it.


I Have used masking tape on all other areas because liquid mask overspray is real hard to remove.








OK, heres where things went wrong.


I removed the paint mask after about 5hours, but it should have been left overnight. Notice the edge of the paint on the body where the mask was removed. It is very rough because the mask ripped its way out of the paint instead of pulling a nice outline out with it.


I then proceeded to tidy up the rough paint edges by trimming the paint with a knife.. this was mistake #2, as you will see later(extra marks in the plastic shell)





at this point i knew i had blown it. The black mist/shadowing was coming out far too dark. Partly due to me being inexperienced with fine misting (blending is easy, but mist/shadowing is harder) and i think it *may* have been because i require the Fine Air tip so i can get a very fine shadowing instead of a heavy effect.





I then used a damp rag to wipe all the flame's off since its waterbased paint. If you do this you need to be careful, one missed spec of paint will really stand out when you redo the body.


Ok, so i cleaned the doors + bonnet back, remasked, re-cut out the mask and re-painted the shell.. We decided to go with a simpler scheme instead at this point.


OK, now for the pics of my dodgy workmanship.


Im extremely annoyed with myself for removing the mask too early. I tried gently knifing the edge of the mask (bad mistake#1) Then trimming the paint back neatly added some extra scratches to the body from the hobby knife (#2). Then, when i re-cut out the 2nd mask this added a third lot of marks to the body. (#3)


Normally, you would not see the original line where the mask is cut however due to it being done a few times and then some colours such as these faspearlsreally highlight the mistakes when you look closely. chrome paints are really bad for showing up scratched lexan.


If you look from a regular distance it looks great, but closeup really shows the flaws









(sorry jim)


(at myself)


(own stupidity with doing it early)
 
#3 ·
some of my previous bodies i have painted for myself and other people.


This is my favourite, and has been my best result (was done previous to jims body)


The whole job just come together so nicely, i was amazed as its my first flame job. The body has a faschange blue with silver backing.





Simple masking job. Simple airbrush spray. I used the blue with a few drops of black for the midnight blue stripe between blue + yellow (the midnight blue stripe looks black)





Candy red near the exhausts, into racing red. orange, Yellow. My first attempt at airbrush blending.





My friend Devos 4Tec Pro (closest) and my 4Tec Pro (far).


Devos body has blue metallic, silver metallic and red metallic down the front.





Devo's BMW. A few drops of blue were added to some silver for the ice blue colour on the rear end. This is the same as whati done for jims flames.





Martiens TC3 "Oval Outlaw" body. Pretty simple design.





Slipperys Tourer. This is actually a solid black body!! We sprayed a gold/purple change paint with a solid black backing and this is the final result. I *think* it may have been tamiya spray cans (i honestly cant remember which)





Slipperys latest Lola body. Unfortunately i havent got a pic of the finished result yet, but the rest of the body thats masked was sprayed a nice yellow to suit the paper decals (xxxmain glued to the car)


"Slippery when wet" road sign on the front & drivers name near cockpit was my personal touch. I thought it suited his name and driving style (his driving style always seems to besideways)





Martien using my gear and spraying the last bit of his El Camino body with my help.





My old Rustler. This was one of my very first blending jobs followed by the red/yellow elcamino for my maxx. (sold rusty to buy the maxx)











SPRAYCAN JOBS:


Slipperys Yokomo GT4 Lola





Slipperys Opel?





My Camaro.





My GTP














+ a few dozen others which i have not posted but the ones (above) done by spraycan were my favourites. The others were just boring jobs.Edited by: Oblivion
 
#4 ·
ahh i see your problem Glen.

You need a Dual action internal mixing airbrush with fine tip for the highlights / shadowing. from what i have read it enables you to vary the air and paint at the same time without causing splatter.

Thread on RCtech has some really good info as well.
TurboCorona on RCtech appears to be an airbrush instructor maybe here can lend some tips.


http://www.rctech.net/forum/showthread.php?t=80896

Edited by: MY_LST
 
#7 ·
'Wreck'? Wrong attitude atty. If you don't have a go, how will you know????


bliv has posted a pretty impressive thread with his 'limited' experience. If you have the gear, or access to it, try a few mundane things first for practice....


Try the inside of the passenger window in you or your mum's car, the bathroom mirror, the neighbours dog. From what I read, time, patience, practice and product is the key.


...and $40? A carton of beer isn't much less than $40! Have a dig. Besides, unless it's a show pony, who's gonna notice at WOT?Edited by: woolly
 
#9 ·
Cheers for the PM Bliv.


After reading this and having spent the last week researching someone to do some airbrushing for me, I've decided I'm gonna get into it myself. I've been looking for that little bit extra to add to my list of excuses to justify an air compressor purchase to the Minister for Finance and I think this will JUST tip the scales in my favour. (You know what sucks, having to ask to spend YOUR OWN frigING MONEY!!).


I've just bought a new house and on it is a rather large shed with a little "office" area partitioned off that will be just perfect for my future forays into airbrushing. Hmmm, I'm quite looking forward to this.
 
#11 ·
I just wanted to add theonly thing regarding this that I know that might be useful.


Stickers -These can be a right not nice person toapply. You get them crooked, you peel them back off, they get less and less adhesive,or worse, you getonepartof the sticker stuck to another part of the stickerand they're ruined.


I've applied stickers to heapsof motorbikes and I'll share the secret with you. Clean the surface,preferably with Prepsol or a similar cleaning solution which will get rid of all the residue that may be on theplastic. Then apply a decent sprayof the soltion (recipe at end of post) to the sticker andwhereyou're putting it. This will makethe sticker able to be moved around until you've got it in the perfect position. Then you just work the fluid out from behind the sticker and dry it off. The metho in the solution helps it to evaporate. If you need,use a softrubber to push the fluid out. The metho also helps to "juice" up the adhesive, which will make the sticker stickmuch better.


Solution Recipe - 1 part metho to about 10 parts water, plus about 5 drops of the secrect ingredient, morning fresh. DO NOT useany other type of detergent. Morning fresh isthe onlyone touse. This last piece of advice comes from a mate of mine who has worked as a motorcycle plastic repairer for 30 years.


Edit: I found thisreview to be VERY helpful in giving me great info to get started.Edited by: Matjp
 
#12 ·
Hi i was just wondering can you use acrylic paint to paint the bodies

because i am getting a airbrush Edited by: lukegt351
 
#13 ·
pactra and other paints are acrylic and work fine, just make sure you use one that is designed for lexan bodies (not regular, ordinary acrylic from a paint store)


matjp - thanks for posting your recipe, ill give that a go next time i do stickers..
 
#20 ·
well seeing you are both in sydney and if you would like one just pm me and i will give u a number of a guy that sells them cheaper than shops ok
 
#22 ·
Wanted to post my first airbrush job thanks to this post..














The camera doesnt seem to pick up the colours however it has a silver outline on the flames (frosty look) and the black is actually mettalic black with gold glitter within the paint..


Any feedback on what to do next time? what to improve etc would be greatly appreciated.Edited by: DECIM8
 
#23 ·
Hey i finally got my airbrush it is a copy of a iwata hpc 30b it is dual action but my problem is getting a attachment to go from the airbrush to the air compressor any help plz
 
#24 ·
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