Art Anderson

A very good way (from my experiences with race car models going back to the mid-1960's) to develop hand-lettering/sign painting techniques in model form is to overpaint decal numbers and even lettering with very small paint brushes and Testors enamels. I had to learn to do that with the often very poorly printed decals on such cars back in the 60's and 70's--most were lithographs rather than screen printed, which gave their colored portions a very grainy look very much like the old "rotogravure" process with photographs printed in newspapers and magazines, or were so weakly pigmented that they did not cover darker body colors well at all. This is sort of like painting up one of those old Craftmaster "Paint-by-Numbers" paintings that were highly popular back in the 50's and 60's--very much learning to "paint between the lines", but I found that process to be both easy to do on poor decals as well as a learning curve for doing my own freehand graphics, such as on my AJ Foyt Coyote which I posted above in this thread. Art

Yes, I put the decals on then added the clear yellow--which really "warms" up the rather dull brown of the decals. My rationale was quite simple: "Back in the day", the only durable finish for exterior wood was oil-based, in the case of wooden boats and station wagon bodies, that meant "marine" or spar varnish, which is a fairly strong amber color, not truly water-clear. This would give a lighter wood, such as hard maple, a yellowish tone, and on darker woods such as mahogany, it gave a much richer, "warmer" brown cast. In retrospect, although I used Testors bottled enamels (gloss tan, lightened with gloss white) as the base color, with artists' oil paint (raw sienna with a bit of burnt umber mixed in) straight from the tube and applied with one of those really small foam applicators used for eye shadow (availabe in most any cosmetics department or a Sally Hanson store), I wish I'd remembered my large bottle of 1936-37 Cord "Cordova Tan" and "Clay Rust" reddish brown lacquer that Dave Dodge at MCW mixed for me about 20 years ago, for painting the base colors. I could have avoided using the kit decals for the mahogany, which nether fit very well and don't stick worth a darn. In addition, the lacquer would have been absolutely proof against the linseed oil carrier of the artists' oil paints, which tended to soften the Testors paints just enough to make it a bit difficult to keep the oil colors from "caking" slightly on the inset panels. That just a bit of "caking" in a few spots made for some roughness near the edges of the kit decals, but it's still OK. To "correct" the small areas where the decals failed to match up to the edges of the wood framing, I used a Sakura Micron artist's drawing pen, Sienna in color, having a .25mm chisel pointed tip (available in art supply stores and at Hobby Lobby). These are the materials and tools I used for the wood-grained effect: Art

Some reference pics for you, taken at the Hostetler Hudson Museum at Shipshewanna IN: The color is metallic gold. Art

That's the plan!

Finalized the wood graining at last! From the very first picture above, I laid on the kit decals (had to use a Micron "sienna" artist's drawing pen to fill in a few places where the mahogany decals were just a shade sort of reaching all the way to the framing detail), then hand-brushed a coat of Tamiya Clear Yellow Acrylic over all the "wood" surfaces. Just as I hoped, the Tamiya gave me exactly the color I was looking for. Art

Vince, I have one of Jeff's Hudson up-tops for the Hudson convertible! What can I say about it except that it's one of the most perfect resin pieces I have ever seen (and I've seen lots of resin, even made a lot of resin parts). Be sure to catch up with Jeff at NNLE and snag that convertible up top--you will NOT be disappointed. Art

Saw the guys from American Racing Miniatures at the IPMS contest at Indianapolis today--they had newly produced kits of the Etzel 1998-99 Dalara Indy winners, the 1924-25-27 Duesenberg 122/91cid Indy winner(s) at the show for sale, along with the 1950's Halibrand magnesium disk wheels and tires (16" front, 18" rear with Firestone tires), and the 274cid Offenhauser 4cyl (bought two of the engines. All done from Chris's original masters, which they now own, the rest of the cars will be coming back on line very quickly. Nice to see this line of cast resin historic Indianapolis cars back and available. Art

I second what Mark is saying here: Bleche White contains TSP as its active ingredient, Spic n Span household cleaner is also TSP,, and is very easily found in the household cleaning supply area of your favorite supermarket. As for cleaning resin parts beforehand, the best resin parts such as Modelhaus may have a mold barrier coating on them, most generally Price-Driscoll Ultra Parfilm. Top quality resin casters use this to extend the surface life of their molds which results in much smoother castings. The silicone RTV rubbers that nearly all casters use is slightly porous, meaning that it tends to absorb some of the liquids that make up both the polyurethane resin and its catalyst. This leads to a deterioration of the mold surfaces, making resulting castings have a rougher surface, and eventually causing the resin to bond to areas of the mold as it hardens, tearing the mold and rendering it useless. Ultra Parfilm is paraffin based, whilch while P-D claims it to be paintable, does interfere with adhesion--so cleaning the parts beforehand is highly recommended. Another alternative cleaner is ordinary naptha, a/k/a lighter fluid, which will remove any Parafilm residue very quickly and holds it in suspension so that it does not "redeposit" on the resin surfaces. Polyurethane resin is also highly resistant to naptha as well. Naptha is still readily available in hardware and paint stores, at in the paint department at Walmart. For the ultimate in paint adhesion on polyurethane resin, there are several "adhesion-promoting" primers available in the autobody trade--used when your body shop paints a new soft bumper cover (those generally are made from a soft, flexible polyurethane). I used to use a clear adhesion primer on all parts that were to be plated, as the pre-coating lacquers used in vacuum metalizing don't always stick that tight to resin castings. This was, and still is made by SEM, and I can still find it at my local store catering to autobody shops and restorers. It is very smooth, semi-gloss, and doesn't hide surface details, and can be painted over with ordinary primers as well. Art

You can also use Alene's Tacky White Glue--it's essentially the same stuff as MicroScale Metal Foil Adhesive. Found in just about every craft store and craft departments at stores such as WalMart. Art

I'd be willing to bet that if somebody did a model kit of the Essex Terraplane, Chryco would never know what that was! (Terraplane was originally a model in Hudson's Essex line). Art

Chuck, the flathead engine came from Revell's '50 Ford pickup. Of the available last-series flatheads on 1/25 scale, to my eyes it's the best, most accurate rendition, but it took some modifications to make it work in the Mercury. The biggest determining factor with this engine is the accurate-looking cylinder heads--AMT's 49 Mercury engine has rather wonky-looking sparkplug leads engraved on the heads, and the heads in the Lindberg '53 Ford are way too flat, too thin to my eyes. The pickup engine took some modification though: Where the truck engine's exhaust manifolds feed into a split exhaust head pipe system (the left side pipe goes under the engine, curves to the rear and joins the right-side pipe at a fairly sharp vee angle) while the passenger car version (Mercury and Ford) still used the old "crossover" pipe from the left manifold to the right manifold, with the final exhaust outlet at the rear of the right-side unit. In addition, the pickup transmission is quite different from the passenger car unit, being a top-loading floor shift model, and having a very short tailshaft housing. I simply modified the '50 Ford exhaust manifolds by removing the original outlet from the left manifold and adding a short stub of Evergreen round stock to make the correct outlet, then bent some 3/32" Evergreen styrene rod stock to make the crossover pipe, which attaches to the left pipe by the new outlet, then made the exhaust inlet for the right manifold in the same manner as the left outlet. 3/32" brass rod was used to make the locating pins which tie it all together. A new rear end exhaust outlet was added to the right manifold at the angle required for the single head pipe. The pickup oil pan is way too deep forward to clear both the crossover pipe and the tie rod system, so the offending area was cut, filled, then filed and sanded to shape. Its transmission was cut away aft of the bell housing, and the tranny from the AMT Mercury engine added. Revell's '50 Ford flathead V8 has very correct front engine mounts which made it necessary to box in the top side of the Mercury frame's front crossmember--which is the accurate way to do it, as the real one is boxed in from the top as well. The rear engine mounting point is the underside of the rear of the tailshaft housing, only a bit of filing on the top of the crossmember there was needed to get the engine to sit where it should. All this meant that a stock exhaust system had to be made--it's done from Evergreen 3/32" rod stock, with a lot of bending and splicing (brass pins into drilled holes there), and a scratchbuilt muffler. And, the whole thing test-fitted together: Art

Great minds think alike! I used 3X5 file cards as my palette. As for the kit, other than some noticeable mold misalignment (Revell really needs to work on this issue!) the kit is so very nice. Art

Only way I build 'em! Engine and chassis: Art

Considering that the active ingredient in Windex is ammonia, I wonder if just ordinary household ammonia would work the same way? Hmmmm? Art

Not exactly "household" items, but you can use the very thin glass "cover slips" used to cover sliced specimens on microscope slides! Art

Pretty simple, actually: the base paint (for the wood) is Testors #1141 Wood, lightened with approximatelhy 25% #1145 Gloss White. For the wood graining effect, I used artist's oil paint straight from the tube (Raw Sienna darkened with a bit of Burnt Sienna), which was applied using "eye shadow" foam pad applicators. The small, fine grain foam applicators made it possible to get the tight "streaks" to give that woodgrain effect without a lot of buildup, and artist's oils, having a very thick, creamy consistency, are very controllable. Credit for the idea of the artist's oil paints goes to Ken Hart, who suggested them to me. One drawback though: Artist's Oil paints take a lot longer to dry than say, enamel paints, given that their carrier (the liquid part) is linseed oil, which dries by oxidization rather than evaporation--but this will be dry enough by Monday, I think, for the application of decals and the final finish--which will be a hand-brushed coat ot Tamiya Acrylic "Clear Yellow". Clear Yellow will give me the "golden" shade I want, to replicate the marine varnish used on these station wagons from the factory. Art

Did a little bit of woodgraining on mine this week! Art

Some thoughts here: 1) There was an excellent "how to" article in either Rod & Custom or Rod & Custom Models magazines circa 1962-64, by legendary Los Angeles car modeler Don Emmons on hand-lettering on model cars. If you can find this article, it's a God-send, literally, because the techniques Emmons showed are both simple and very doable, even more-so today. Surely someone who frequents this forum or the one sponsored by Spotlight Hobbies has that article and can scan it for you. 2) The techniques for "sign writing" on a model car are really not that much different than the old "classic" sign-writers used--only 1/25 (or whatever scale one is using) smaller. 3) Good reference photos are most valuable, even if they aren't of the exact graphics you are trying to replicate, as sign-painters tended to have a pretty good repertoire (albeit often huge) of lettering fonts and styles that they learned over time. Many of those lettering fonts and styles can be found online. Of course, a lot of race car numbers tended to be very "stylized", particularly by the late 1950's and through the 60's, even beyond, but the basic principles and techniques really didn't change all that much back in the days of hand-painted signage (virtually all the painters who lettered and numbered those race cars of decades past were professional sign painters, and in between the infrequent race car gigs could be found lettering all manner of commercial vehicles, as well as painting signs, storefronts, even lettering office and retail store doors. And this leads me to the next suggestion: 4) A very good reference for how those sign painting artists did what they did, is to look for pictures of well-worn commercial vehicles (they are out there online for the sheer dozens. Worn hand-painted signage often shows the brush strokes, how they did what they did, which can show how sign painters filled in the larger, wider graphics, brush stroke by brush stroke, and that leads me to what I used for brushes in 1/25 scale: 5) I pretty much settled on just three or four sizes of detailing brushes: #1, #0, #5/0 and #10/0 artists "rounds", which can be found with shorter handles like the detailing brushes we modelers tend to use. Look for good quality red sable brushes, and further, look carefully through any selection, choosing only those which have a well-defined sharp point to them. Rather than looking at common brushes often found alongside model paints in a hobby shop--if you have an art supply store handy (or even the artists' supply department of a Michael's or Hobby Lobby), check out their brushes--and keep looking to find the best. 6) As for paints, while yes, "One Shot" sign writing paints are tremendous, they are not available just anywhere, and they do come in pretty large cans--4-6 fluid ounces. In addition, One Shot is old-fashioned "4-hour" enamel (unless their formula has changed markedly) meaning that they take almost that long just to get to the "tacky" stage, and require a good 24 hours or more to dry thoroughly. For my model race cars (mostly built 1966-85) I found that Testors bottle paints worked just fine. 7) While I didn't have available clear decal film for most of my race car building "period", when it became generally available, I found clear film very valuable for hand-painting letters, numbers and race car logo's, simply because it was far easier to do that "on the flat" than on the undulations and curvature of a model car body shell. Once these were done on decal film, they can be cut out, and applied just like any printed decal. For a palette, I found, per Don Emmons' article, that a small glass mirror (Emmons used mirrors from his wife's old purses and/or cosmetic compacts) for testing brush strokes and even for mixing tiny bits of color. When done, a razor blade, Xacto knife, or even a bit of paper towel soaked in lacquer thinner cleans all the paint off glass in a heartbeat--and the paint does NOT soak into glass. Here is the one remaining example of an Indy car that I built in 1978, AJ Foyt's 1977 Coyote, the car that carried Foyt to his 4th Indianapolis Victory--virtually all the graphics specific to this car were hand painted with the brushes and paints I described. Those include the #'s 14, the Gilmore Broadcasting Logo, Foyt's "signature" name on the sides of the cowling, the "cowboy hat" logo, and the "Coyote" emblem on the front of the cowling. Of course, the Diehard and Goodyear logo's are decals. In short, nothing beats the look of that old-school hand painted work by classic sign painters (who ruled before the advent of laser-cut, computer generated graphics) than miniature hand-painted race car graphics, in my opinion. Art

I believe that the Vert-A-Pac program that GM and the railroad(s) developed did not survive the Vega. Here in Lafayette, which is the home of Subaru Indiana Automotive, and on one of the major railroad mainlines servicing several auto plants, we can see as many as a thousand automobile-hauling freight cars on any given day--and NONE of them are this type of cars (at least I've not seen any of those in almost 40 years). According to Wikipedia, only 452 Vert-A-Pac cars were produced--all conversions of 85' piggyback flatcars in 1971-73, and all were withdrawn from service in 1977, and were refitted with conventional tri-level decking. Art

No, The Vertipak boxcar concept was meant to get more Vega's onto freight cars than was possible with the 85' Trilevel Autoracks then in use. It wasn't very successful, as railroads and even TTX were at best lukewarm to the concept and not being willing to lay out tons of money for such a new concept. The other flaw was simply that the fluids in the engine tended to get into places where they should not be. Art

Frankly, I like both contests and NNL's--there's always a lot of camaraderie either way. Art

I've never objected to contest judges picking up any of my models for the purpose of seeing clearly the underside--after all, unless my model is entered as "curbside" I want the judges to see and evaluate the work I've put into the entire underside. If one has ever attended a concours d'elegance or a carefully judged AACA or single marque club show--those judges go all over the cars being judged, over, under around and through to evaluate all restoration work for correctness and workmanship--and that includes crawling underneath the cars to see the chassis and undersides. I always figure that if they do that at real car shows, I have no problem with a contest judge making a reasonable effort to judge any of my cars completely--and that means "over, under, around and through" at least to the extent possible. I've also been willing to take the risk that yes, my model might get damaged--BUT in over 50 years of entering model cars in contests, I have yet to have a model damaged--yet I am very well aware that it's happened to others. It's also been my understanding that damage to a model by a judge tends to be pretty rare--it doesn't happen at every contest, nor does it happen to every model car entered. Just my personal beliefs expressed. Art

Bill's got this pretty right, with one exception: Every AMT '34 Ford from the mid-1980's has a cowling, hood and top of the grille that is more than a little bit too flat--the real ones are much more rounded, albeit nowhere near as rounded as what AMT did with their 3-window back about 1975. Anyone besides me think it's time for a truly accurate model kit of a '33-'34 Ford Model 40? Hmmmmm? Art

Bill, to corroborate, I've read that where the 60's 250GTO is concerned, NO body panels were the same, car-to-car, simply due to the fact that every body panel was hand-hammered out, many of them on little more than tree stumps and lead shot bags. Art

All things considered, bear in mind that every original 250GTO had bodywork hand-hammered out over wooden forms, and no two are exactly alike, so exact comparisons between any model of one and the real thing, if not exactly the same car, can be VERY subjective. That said, the old Aurora kit, while very nice for the era in which it was designed and tooled, was pretty nice--but the "art" and the "science" (engineering if you will) of model car kits has definitely advanced a good ways beyond where both were in 1963, when Aurora was working up this kit. Art