Painting: The Horror. Help!
gr...@fubarpm-tech.com
I want to describe my recent painting experiences. Found out some good
things, and a number of bad things. I'm hoping someone can tell me what
I did wrong, or offer suggestions on better ways to do these things.
And hopefully, some of my good discoveries will be of use to others.
First off, I'm just getting back into things. I built rockets for about
10 years when I was 9-19 years old, but havn't done anything with them
recently until early this year. So I went out and bought a selection of
paint from various places. Mostly spray lacquers or compatible paints.
I've found that I don't like enamels. They take forever to harden, becuase
of this, are really prone to sags, and you can't put much of anything
over them if you decide to change your mind.
The lacquers dry fast, hard, and you can paint over them. The problem is
finding spray can laquers in a range of colors. Most of the bright colors
only come in enamels.
I have an Estes big bertha and several LOC models that I'm building. The
big bertha was meant to be a practice rocket.
So, for priming I used an automotive sandable "scratch filling" primer.
Made by Duplicolor. Great stuff. Worked well. I little bit pricier than
the no-name brand sandable primer, but worked well. I also used Bondo
red-laq putty for filling in seams, dents, etc. Wet sanded with 400 and
600 grit between coats. Alternated grey and red primer between coats.
The priming went well. I was doing the Big Betha's body and nosecone, and
the nosecones from my LOC Graduator and LOC IV. I followed all the
recomendations for preping the LOC nosecone plastic and the paint bonded well.
Then, as a basecoat for the color, I put a coat of white lacquer on
everything. What I used is Krylon Colorworks "LS 1400 Gloss White Lacquer".
This is amazing stuff. I'll explain why further on. I put 2 coats of this
paint on everything.
I decided I wanted to leave the nosecone for the Graduator white, so I put
a third coat on it, followed by 2 coats of Duplicolor clear lacquer.
This nosecone is done, and I like the results.
Now, for the color. Here is where everything went wrong. I wanted something
that was very visible. Earlier experience had taught me that bright yellow
was the best, and flourescent colors were every better. I decided that I
was going to paint all of the Big Bertha flour-yellow, and the nosecone
of the LOC IV. My earlier experience with flourescent paints had also
taught me that they tend to come out flat, thick and "fuzzy" on the
surface. But I figured I would experiment with it. Sand them down and
put a couple of layers of clear over them.
I first tried using Krylon "FS 920 YELLOW" flouresent paint. I used it
on the LOC IV nosecone. It went on a little "dry" and fuzzy, but not too
bad. It leveled out a little. And a second coat left a rough surface, but
not too bad. After 24 hours. I was able to sand it fairly smooth and then
I put a coat of Duplicolor clear lacquer over it. The first coat of clear
was *almost* a problem. It appeared that the clear lacquer melted the yellow
krylon. No wrinkles or cracks, but it appeared that the yellow was starting
to flow and mix with the clear. The clear dryed fairly quickly and I sanded
the surface and put on 2 more layers of clear. The first had apparently
sealed the surface and the next 2 layers went on fine. I'm happy with the
finished nosecone.
BTW, it's not clear what type of paint this stuff is. It doesn't say
anything about being either an enamel or a lacquer. However, the drying
times and the instructions tend to indicate that it's less likely to
be of the enamel type. There's no "less than an hour, more than 48
hours" recoating type instructions.
Next I went to the Big Bertha. The first can of Krylon Flour-yellow had
started to spit from it's nozzle near the end of painting, so I had 2
cans and I decided to use the other one. Now, I don't know if the ensuing
problems were due to the second can being from a second batch, or if the
temperature was too hot. I paint in my attached garage. It's non-insulated
and it can get pretty warm in there on a sunny day. Like in the 90's.
When I spray on the paint it went on very dry, very clumpy, lots of
fuzzys. It obviously wasn't running, so I put on extra paint in an attempt
to get it "wet" so it would level out. It just wasn't happening. So I
set it aside to dry and figured I'd just sand out the fuzzys and use
several coats of clear to give a nice gloss. Well, I waited for it to
dry. In a very warm garage. And it just never dryed/hardened/cured/whatever.
After 4 days, the surface still felt soft and slightly tacky. Attempts
to sand it didn't produce dust, it caused the paint to "roll" off in
somewhat the same way as dried elmers glue will roll of your fingers
when you rub them together.
I noticed a large spot and used my fingernail on it and was surprised to
find that I could just scrape off the paint. It was soft, somewhat the
consistency of hard butter. The white lacquer coat was cleanly visible
underneath. At this point, I said f**k it, and got a flatware spoon and
butter knife from the kitchen and proceded to scrap almost all the
flour-yellow paint off the big bertha and it's nosecone. I expected that
I would have to sand all the scratches out of the white lac underneath
and then put on another couple of coats of white and start over with a
new topcolor.
Well, after I had scraped as much as I could, I found that pure Isopropyl
alchohol would dissolve away the remaining yellow paint. This is where
I made my first pleasent discovery. After spending a half hour running
a stainless steel spoon and dull knifeblade over the surface of the
rocket body and the nosecone, there WAS NOT A SINGLE SCRATCH in the
krylon white lacquer. This stuff is *HARD*. It goes on nice, doesn't
run, drys quickly and drys to a high gloss, and then it appears to be
very scratch resistent. I'm very impressed.
Now the down side. It only appears to be available in Gloss White, Gloss
Black, Flat Black, and Clear. No colors. At least, not in any of the stores
in my area. Bummer.
Ok, so I decide to clean up the surface, give it a light sanding and put
one more coat of the Gloss White Lacquer on. I'm not sure, but it appears
that there's a slight yellow cast left behind on the white. BTW, I clean
the surface of this paint with 99% isopropyl alcohol. It seems to be
completely resistant to it. The description on the paint says:
"Colorworks from Krylon Lacquer spray finishes give an ussually tough,
hard coating. They resist alcohol, hot or cold water, gasoline and
grease."
Apparently all true.
So, not wanting to give up entirely on flourescent colors, I look around
some more. In another hardware store I find these small 3oz cans of
Krylon "Short Cuts" paint. Most of them are enamel. But they have 2
colors of flourescent, yellow and orange, that are clearing labeled as
"lacquer". So I pick up 2 cans of the "Hobby/craft Lacquer paint SCS-052
glow yellow".
First I paint the Big Bertha nosecone. This paint seems to have the opposite
problem of the first flourescent paint. It's too thin. It's goes on wet,
very wet, and it's hard to keep it from running. With a little care,
I get 2 coats on and get a reasonable finish. After 24 hours, it's dry,
but not what I would call "hard". It's sandable, but still somewhat soft.
I find that bits of the black emory paper tend to get lodged into the paint.
After sanding, I go to put on the clear coat. This time, instead
of the Duplicolor clear lacquer, I decide to use Krylon "LS 1405 CLEAR
lacquer". This is from the exact same familiy as the Gloss white that
has worked so well for me so far. Same green can. Same instructions,
same mention about being resistant to alchol, gasoline, etc. Well, it
doesn't perform like the white at all. Whereas the white dried and was
sandable and hard in about an hour, the clear seemed to need more like
24 hours. And after 24 hours, the surface wasn't so much "hard" as it
was "tough". It was glossly all right, but whereas the white had a somewhat
slippery surface that I could easily glide my fingers over, the clear
tended to "grab" my fingers. Not tacky really, more like the way that
warm vinyl tends to grab at skin. Also, when I try to sand the surface,
it tends to grab at the emory paper. Also, *BIG* difference here, while
the white was totally immune to isopropyl, the clear was dissolved by
it. Going over the surface with a paper towel soaked in isopropyl got
the surface all soft and sticky again. Argh. So I let the surface dry,
and then I buffed it down with 600 wet sanding, and then I put a layer
of the Duplicolor clear lacquer over the Krylon clear. This produced a
reasonably hard surface. Ok, big bertha nosecone done.
So, I go back to the big bertha body with the Krylon short cuts flour-
yellow lacquer. First coat isn't too bad. But I got a number of sags.
Decided to wait 24 hours. Sand them down and put on a second coat. After
24 hours, the surface is still somewhat soft. Instead of the sanding
producing a feather edge, it tends to just scrap large areas of the yellow
off back down to the white. So I wait another day or 2. Now it seems hard
and I'm able to feather sand the problem areas. Ok, sandings done, I'm just
going to spot spray, the spots that were sanded down to white. Oh gag.
The spray leaves this ghastly splotchy look to the edges of my touchyps.
Ok, I'll just give the whole thing a light coat. It's not too bad, but
the sanded spots don't look right. I leave the thing to dry for a few
minutes, and when I come back I find that whole areas are starting to
slough off. I run my finger across a fin and find that the second coat
of yellow has completely dissolved the first coat I put on 2 days earlier.
The resultant combined coat is too heavy and is sliding off everywhere.
Damn. Damn. Damn. I go get a roll of paper towels and I'm able to wipe
75% of the yellow paint off the rocket. Another half hour with paper
towels, isopropyl, and q-tips, and I'm back to a white rocket again.
At this point, I think the Rocket-Ghods are telling me this was meant to
be a WHITE ROCKET. :-) So, it's going to remain a white Big Bertha with a
yellow nosecone.
Ok, some questions:
1.) I'm bought several cans of Duplicolor automotive paint that is
described as "acrylic lacquer". The good krylon stuff I have is
simply called "lacquer", and I have also bought a can of another
type of Krylon clear called "Krylon Crystal Clear Acrylic Coating".
(White can with 5 colored round balls on the front.) Can someone
give me the low down on what the differences are between "Lacquer",
"Acrylic Lacquer", and "Acrylic"?
2.) Does anyone know if the Krylon "LS 1400" family of Lacquers is
available in other colors?
3.) Anyone know why the Krylon 1405 Clear wasn't immune to Isopropyl
when the 1400 White was? And both cans stated that the paint should
be resistant to alcohol?
4.) Anybody know of a *decent* brand of flourescent lacquer spray paint
that I can get in cans?
5.) Would high temperature have caused my problems with the first
flourescent paint? Possible driven out the solvents before the
paint had a chance to "cure"?
6.) Suggestions for other sources of paint? The Duplicolor line seems
like decent paint, but it's meant to reproduce specific factory
finishes for cars and trucks. It's hard to find any *bright* colors
in this line. They're mostly darker shades of red/green/blue/brown/
black/etc.
7.) I found a local hobby store that some rocket stuff, but they are for
the most part geared to the R/C plane crowd. Most of their paint was
for planes. I found a rack of paint that came in bright colors and
that was specifically for planes as it listed resistance to the fuel
as one of it's main propertys. However, it didn't say anything about
what it was based on, lacquer, enamel, dope, acrylic. Nada, so I
didn't buy any. What's available in this area and what are the
compatibility issues?
8.) Any and all other comments on any of the above?
---
Thanks for the help
Greg Cronau
TRA# 6304 L0
gregc <at> pm-tech {dot} com
Jeff
On 22 May 1998 18:30:21 -0400, gr...@FUBARpm-tech.com wrote:
>> long sad story snipped <<
>8.) Any and all other comments on any of the above?
Greg,
I can't explain the various reactions you've had between different
paints - but I've experienced some of them and I'll be curious to see
what others say about it.
I can however mention a type of paint I've found to work very well -
and that's the spray enamel from ACE Hardware. It has there own name
on it - I don't know if that's a labeling thing or if they actually
make it. At any rate - the nozels are different than Krylon's (which I
'used' to use), and it gives a very nice spray and coverage when
applied. The colors are also much more 'vibrant' looking than
Krylon's. I've been very pleased with the results - and the finishes
seem tough enough for my standards. I've used their primer and clear
coats as well, although I'm not sure if there is much difference in
the primer. I have used Krylon primer with the ACE paint and it works
fine. I usually only use clear when decals are involved - a personal
choice I guess.
Good Luck,
Jeff
Bukshirt
>6.) Suggestions for other sources of paint? The Duplicolor line seems
> like decent paint, but it's meant to reproduce specific factory
> finishes for cars and trucks. It's hard to find any *bright* colors
> in this line. They're mostly darker shades of red/green/blue/brown/
> black/etc.
try looking at the automotive paints closer. Try and find
a true "CHEVY ORANGE" engine enamal not the red that
some brands try to pass off. I use this on most of my rockets.
looks good and is highly visible. As with any enamal let it dry several days
before doing any thing with it.
ModRocManiac
gr...@FUBARpm-tech.com wrote in article <6k4u9t$p...@altair.pm-tech.com>...
[Mucho Snipo]
> Ok, some questions:
>
> 1.) I'm bought several cans of Duplicolor automotive paint that is
> described as "acrylic lacquer". The good krylon stuff I have is
> simply called "lacquer", and I have also bought a can of another
> type of Krylon clear called "Krylon Crystal Clear Acrylic Coating".
> (White can with 5 colored round balls on the front.) Can someone
> give me the low down on what the differences are between "Lacquer",
> "Acrylic Lacquer", and "Acrylic"?
Lacquer = Paint/coating made from insect secretions and plant secretions.
Acrylic Lacquer = a mix of acrylic and lacquer
Acrylic = Oil=based paint/coating
****************************************************************************
ModRocManiac
A.K.A. Owen K.
E-mail me: ModRoc...@TheVortex.comp
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Or ICQ Me: 9143878
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"Once thou hast smelt the smoke, thou shalt never turneth back."
____________________________WOOSH!!________________________{[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[>
The Silent Observer
Bill Westfield wrote:
>
> Lacquer = Paint/coating made from insect secretions and plant secretions.
> Acrylic Lacquer = a mix of acrylic and lacquer
> Acrylic = Oil=based paint/coating
>
> exclusively to water-thinnable paints (all the way from artists tube-style
> to liquids to sprays to future floor wax.) I'd bet on acrylic being any
> paint based on a particular acrylic polymer resin (methyl methacrylate?),
> and "acrylic lacquer" being some acrylic paint that's supposed to look like
> an "old fashioned laquer finish" when it's dry.
>
> "Lacquer" as defined would seem to imply the Lac insect (ie shellac), but
> the solvents used are considerably nastier than the alcohol usually used
> for shellac itself.
>
> I'd wonder if definitions are based on the percentage of resin used. Clear
> nitrate dope can have very little actual nitrocellulose in it (probably 5%
> to 10%) to result in a "thick" liquid, while usable shellac is about 30%
> shellac resin (and still rather "thin" compared to "NC lacquer".) I suppose
> it's interesting that "nitrate dope" is the same thing as "NC lacquer"...
One of the defining differences between lacquers and enamels are that,
in general, lacquers dry solely by solvent evaporation -- this includes,
for a short list, NC lacquer, aka nitrate dope, other dopes such as
butyrate, most varnishes, and genuine shellac -- while enamels cure by a
chemical reaction, such that (in most, if not all cases) the original
solvent reducer or carrier won't redissolve a fully cured enamel --
examples being the alkyd and acrylic enamels used in plastic model
paints and auto paints from the 1960s until urethane and epoxy
formulations overtook enamels, as well as classic oil paints (both
artists' variety and house paints, which all "dry" by curing of linseed
oil) and, yes, artists' acrylics and Future floor wax.
There are paints that don't fit either category -- the two-part "epoxy"
urethanes, for one example, as well as others that are more like dyes or
stains -- but most of what we use on rockets are either lacquers or
enamels.
For examples we're all likely to be familiar with, ordinary spray paint
in a can is practically all enamel of one sort of another (don't forget,
there's a pretty wide range of enamels, including acrylic formulae that
thin and clean with water), while the deep, multi-layer, hand-rubbed
finish you see on show cars and hot rods is most commonly lacquer.
--
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Gather the Gods in Darkness;
And darkness weaves with many shades. -- fragment attributed to Opyros
Donald Qualls, aka The Silent Observer NAR # 70141-SR Insured
Rocket Pages http://members.aol.com/silntobsvr/launches.htm
Opinions expressed are my own -- take them for what they're worth
and don't expect them to be perfect.
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