Alclad black gloss coat questions

Hi Route,

I just finished painting my 1/48 P-47N with Alclad.  I, too, am still a newbie at using Alclad.  With that being said, I used MM gloss black as my base coat.  It was very glossy and smooth to the touch.  However, I have read SO MANY articles and posts where people said they still polished the paint afterwards.  Normally I hate creating work for myself but I figured I would give the whole "polishing the gloss paint" thing a try.

I experienced the same thing you did in that it took the paint off the edges and off of some raised surface details.  All I can say is that it had no detrimental effect on how the Alclad looked after applying it.  In fact, I'd say that I was very happy with how the polishing made the Alclad turned out. I think if I hadn't polished the gloss base coat, even the slightest orange peel, no matter how imperceptible to the touch, would have been shown, if not magnified.  I have a P-38 that's ready to be painted and I'm definitely going to polish down the base coat before I apply the Alclad.  I think it made a big difference.

Eric

I found the Alclad black hard to work with.  Fast drying lacquer like that can create orange peel very easily, and then it has to be polished.  Orange peel cannot be coated with Alclad metal finishes- they are too thin.  There is a big difference between the size of the bumps in matt finish and orange peel.

I too use the MM gloss black. It takes a long time to dry, but it is easy to get a gloss finish on it.  I find it easier to start with the gloss finish and control the sheen by the variations in application of the metalizer, or by the choice of the metalizer to use, i.e., polished aluminum, aluminum, or white aluminum.  I find using either the polished or the plain aluminum, I can lay down areas of different sheen just by how thin or thick a coat I lay down.  A single thin coat with the aluminum is needed to get a polished sheen.  You can put down two coats to get a more weathered look.  With the regular aluminum, just varying the thickness of application gives slight, realistic variations in sheen.  It is also possible to get variations in sheen by using gloss, matt or semi-matt undercoats, but I find I get better control by starting with the gloss.

I also can get a slight tint to color by using a dark blue or dark brown undercoat.

On Youtube, Will Pattison did a whole series of tests on this subject and it's well worth the view.

The trick with Alclad is the base underneath it. ANY and I mean ANY blems or flaws in the paint or surface under the Alclad will be glaringly highlighted by the Alclad. I find to get a uniform, smooth finish with Alclad I have to micro sand the base, what ever it is, in order to get that perfect surface to apply the Alclad. Since the Alclad black base is a bit tricky to work with, I do sand it down (only in the direction of airflow). To my eye this leaves a more realistic tone to the finished product. A super shiny bird is only realistic in show planes, not actual planes that saw any use. Play around with different techniques until you find one that suits your style.

BK

Alclad black has been known for their notorious for issues. Save yourself the headache and use plain gloss black paint instead.

Thanks for all the posts.  It sounds like that due to the fast dry time of Alclad gloss black due to being a laquer, a good wet coat can not be achived as easily as a gloss black enamel.  I am going to go ahead and polish everything I applied the alclad black using 4000 and 6000 wet sand and then do a coat of a gloss black enamel.  I have a bottle of MM gloss black.  

For normal Alclad, you should be useing a flat black, they recomend their black primer, which i use a lot and have had no issues with. The Alclad gloss black is meant for their high shine colours.

For what it's worth, I used Alclad Gloss Blac exactly one time. It didn't want to work well, and I have used Tamiya X-1 Gloss Black for the shiny ones ever since. For anything but their high-shine colors, I just spray it over whatever primer or paint color is already hanging out on the part.

With Tamiya, if you want to get a sweet gloss coat, spray your gloss black, then come back and mist it with Mr. Levelling Thinner (or Tamiya Lacquer Thinner). It helps relax the paint, and it will self-level to a really nice shine.

Oh, and my advice is to stay away from Alclad Klear Kote. It doesn't seem to ever want to dry, and it's like decal carrier film hilighter.

-BD-

Don Stauffer

I found the Alclad black hard to work with.  Fast drying lacquer like that can create orange peel very easily, and then it has to be polished.

Actually, Alclad gloss black base is an enamel. It is confusing because every bottle says "Alclad II Lacquers" but that is just the branding. Some of their paints are water-based acrylic, too.

I've tried it and I'm pretty happy with the performance.

I wanted to round out this thread with the results of using MM gloss black.  I wet sanded the entire model with 3500 grit.  I sanded until most of the alclad metal coat was removed and only the black alclad gloss showed through.  Some spots went down to primer.  I dried off the model and using a hair dryer got any remaining water out.  

I thinned the MM gloss black approx 50/50 and sprayed it at 12 psi.  Two mist coats and two wet coats approx 3-5 mins apart.  The final results are much better.  a very glossy finish with only orange peel to deal with.  The shine is very even and I have a thicker coat of paint to buff out the orange peel.  

I will give it several days to a week to dry.  The weather is perfect for paint right now in Florida, dry and in the high 70s.  Thanks all for recommending to go to a gloss enamel.  It was much more predictable and stayed wet long enough for the wet coat passes to blend into each other.

I've never used the Alclad gloss black - but I'm a big fan of their metal finish paints.  I too shoot MM gloss black, put down the Alclad and then hit the panel lines with a thinned tamiya smoke

Thanks for the pics keavdog.  What Alclad metal color did you use on the mustang and thunderbolt?  Did you polishing or wet sand the gloss black prior to applying the metal coat and if so can you describe your process and what grits you used?

I spray thin coats of Tamiya gloss black enamel and when I have a good cover I spray a last coat of 10% enamel and 90% miniral turps. I found that the turps flashes off slower than thinners and lets the enamel flow out well.

. by Theunis van Vuuren, on Flickr

Then I use airframe alluminium to give various shades by masking off some pannels and then spraying a few more pannels to lighten them. 

If I want a slight weathered look I will shoot a thin coat of alclad clear semigolss to dull it down a little, it doesnt alther the metal feel of alclad.

. by Theunis van Vuuren, on Flickr

Here it a Mig 21 in the same tecnique of airframe allu over gloss black, for a higher shine I use clear alclad closs

. by Theunis van Vuuren, on Flickr

On my F-51 I used duraluminiu on the wings and airframe allu on the fuselage. This time weatherd with semi matt clear alclad.

. by Theunis van Vuuren, on Flickr

Theuns

Aluminum - ALD 101

No buff/polish on the black.

Theuns,  That is the same Hasegawa F-86 kit I am building.  Thanks for the pics.  

That is a really nice kit to build, good fit, exelent detail. The decals were a little on the brittle side but went on well.

Theuns

Good to know about the decals.  I plan to build the same paint scheme that you did.  Since the decal sheet provides the large decals with stars as well as just the stars, I was planning on painting all the color and decaling the stars only.  

Yes, the kit did go together nicely with little seam work.  I added a resin pit and intake scoop.  I will post pics as soon as I get the first coat of NMF on it.

Just take your time with those large decals, dont force them off the paper. You will find that the alclad is so smooth that you do not really need anny setting solution on it, I just used tamiya markfit to help it slide on better.You can also use micro sol over the decals to seat them, it  does not affect the alcld, however try not to let it pool on the paint.

Here you can see that even the large fuselage decals with clear carrier film does not alter the alcld look. I did however weather the whole plane a bit by spraying a light coat of alclad semi gloss over it .

. by Theunis van Vuuren, on Flickr

I just used the kit's pit.

. by Theunis van Vuuren, on Flickr

Theuns