Hi Ya'll!!
I don't know about you, but once in a while I will go over my old mags just for kicks. In the April 2016 issue of Scale Auto the question was asked. How do you paint a car by Brush and make it look right? I have done this many times and because I cannot find the next issue I thought I would bring this one to light. Painting anything by brush that's not a figure is or can be an exercise in futility.
The trick is to know your medium and work accordingly. These aren't the days of Pactra's "No Brush Marks,"Garaunteed", For sure. I don't know about you, but I would NEVER try it with Tamiya's Acrylics! Model master had some gloss that would work, but they were limited. Testors Square Bottles still can be gotten in Metallics. You say but it doesn't look right! But it can. There's a trick.
First off is the paint. Out of the bottle it's too thick. I never liked de-canting and thinning for airbrush because I would inevitably get clogs! So I would use a technique I developed for the Pactra paints I started with. First is the brush. A 1/8 to 1/4 inch soft bristle flattie is your tool of choice. Second is a pointed 1/8 or 1/16 inch detailing brush. Now for the paint. Testor's Metallic Teal is a nice color, but in it's original, out of the Bottle consistency it's like thinned honey. You have to have it thinned!
I usually thin it to about 50/50 or 75/25 thinner versus paint, use ALL the paint in the bottle cleaning it out when you move it to a wide mouth Jar(Testors M.M. jars are perfect for this.) Now, here's the fun. Put your mix in the bottle making sure of your measurements. Now shake the living daylights out of it. Open, clean the top and rim and dip the 1/4 inch brush into it only a quarter of the way. Start at the edge of a body panel.Say, left front fender first. Brushing from the Cowl/Door Opening to the front. One thing to do first is to put a light coat around the wheel opening. As you paint blend around this edge. Two good coats should be enough.
While doing this make sure you have avoided darker streaks by overlapping gently. Then paint the left hand Door, painting from front to back edge. You will pick up paint from the door opening line. That's what you want, so that is okay. Do not overlap on the quarter panel! Then Paint The quarter, Not overlapping the trunk panel.
Yes, this sounds tedious, but just wait. The thinner paint will self level. IF you do not put the car body down the normal way. When you have painted one side you want that side to be horizontal to the table-top. The paint will self level as it out-gasses under a normal desk lamp.This also has a tendency to "bake" the finish, kind -of.
Yes, this is more tedious and chancy, but when you get to the end it will be worth it! Ya see by doing it this way you avoid runs! After all the panels are painted, and you have avoided overpainting chrome areas then the next step is called for after about a week. You take your Paint brush,The fattest thinnest fan one and apply a final coat of 90/10 thinner to paint. I would rather at this point you misted this on with the old Badger or Paasche A/B! This way All panels will match and you will only have the mist-coat on the chrome trim. (It's easier to remove it then). let this set up and out gas under the good old desk lamp for another four days. yes a long time for sure. Now wet sand with the finest grit you can get lightly and only in straight lines avoiding Burn through at edges and ridges. Now Polish it! Again don't Burn-Through.
It's a tedious method, but that's all we had when the first model cars hit the shelves. Straight out of the bottle Non Pactra paint wouldn't let you avoid runs and unequal coverage in certain colors. I used to watch them painting in the local Earl Scheib and watch them carefully and the one guy always seemed to get awesome jobs that were even and No orange Peel. That's how he did it on the real cars, so, that's how I did it until I met my first Bottle of Pactra(Which was their beautiful Mandarin Red!) Go For It and Good Luck with an old but proven way of doing non-spray paint jobs( the Mist coat is only to equalize it, You don't Have to do it) ! T.B.