Warbonnet paint related emergency

[thomasjmdavis]

One the BLI thread in product discussion, there were some pics of the new run of F units, and they appeared to have several issues that my 10? year old IM F3s did not.  So I pulled one out of the box to take a look.  I was correct, the nose of my old F3A looks better than the new ones do in photos.

BUT.....

While examining it, I discovered that the yellow paint (or is it a decal?) had cracked and was starting to lift from the nose (pardon the phone photos, but best I can do at the moment).  It was new from the factory when I bought it.  Not sure I have had it out of its box since we moved a couple years ago.  It has been handled gently, no dives off the layout or anything like that. Did spend a night in the truck during the move in winter weather- but 20s or 30s, not sub zero.






I am thinking that the best approach might be to try to apply some ACC under the chip using a thin needle applicator, although I can see any number of things going wrong.  Anyone have a better idea?  Anyone have this particular issue in the past?

Thanks for any and all suggestions...

[peteski]

That is really odd. I have never seen a factory-painted model paint separate from the bare plastic.  Did it shrink too?   I think that maybe dropping some lacquer thinner into the gap would allow the paint to soften and be re-attached to the plastic shell.   But you would need ot find some sort of miniature applicator for the lacquer thinner. If you have one of those "touch-n'Flow" hypodermic needle liquid cement applicators, that shoudl work well to get the liquid into that area.

[cgw]

if its a decal get some micro sol  and dab it on the crack it will settle down.   if its paint adhesion issue you may be screwed.   The nose may have had some mold release still on the surface when it got painted and the paint cured over time it shrunk and popped off in the localized area.    You can get some Tamiya thin cement (green cap bottle) and put a small amount in the crack with the brush.   Capillary action my pull the solvent into the gap and soften the paint enough to get adhesion again.     If you go this route apply the material and do not touch the part for about a day after applying the Tamiya thin cement.    Even if it looks dry it can still be "squishy enough" to take on a finger print.   

[jnevis]

if its a decal get some micro sol  and dab it on the crack it will settle down.   if its paint adhesion issue you may be screwed.   The nose may have had some mold release still on the surface when it got painted and the paint cured over time it shrunk and popped off in the localized area.    You can get some Tamiya thin cement (green cap bottle) and put a small amount in the crack with the brush.   Capillary action my pull the solvent into the gap and soften the paint enough to get adhesion again.     If you go this route apply the material and do not touch the part for about a day after applying the Tamiya thin cement.    Even if it looks dry it can still be "squishy enough" to take on a finger print.   

WARNING Mandatory RW thread drift ahead......
Was lucky enough to get a tour of the restoration hangar at the Dulles Air&Space Museum a few weeks back.  They are doing basically that to restore the paint on the B-26 "Flak Bait."  They are using a heat gun to lift the paint slightly then gluing it back down so they retain as much of the original paint as possible.

....We now return to your regularly scheduled thread.

If you have yellow paint that matches you might be able to lift the section coming up, mask and paint the offending section.  LIGHTLY scoring the yellow above the light should stop it from lifting outside the yellow.

[nscaler711]

I'd suggest touching it up with ATSF yellow. From I think Badger Modelflex???

[thomasjmdavis]

I've emailed Intermountain and asked them about the paint used on the models, in hopes of getting a better idea about compatible adhesives or solvents.  In the meanwhile, thanks all for the good advice and ideas.  Worst case scenario, maybe I will change the number to 19, which IIRC, is the unit that was involved in a couple notable accidents,
http://framework.latimes.com/2011/11/14/santa-fe-locomotive-goes-through-wall/

That is really odd. I have never seen a factory-painted model paint separate from the bare plastic.  Did it shrink too?

I think the separation is between 2 layers of paint (or the paint and primer). I assume they would have painted a red nose, and then painted yellow, or primer then yellow, over the red.  But I will admit not being up to date on the process manufacturers use nowadays.  It doesn't look like it has shrunk- it looks like it will go right back in place if I can get it to stick. My touch and flow clogged up some while back, but I have a bottle with a very thin needle that I think could do the job.

if its a decal get some micro sol  and dab it on the crack it will settle down.

I may try this first, whatever residue it would leave behind would be minimal, even if it doesn't work. 

do not touch the part for about a day after applying the Tamiya thin cement.

And thanks for that note- patience is not one of my virtues.

LIGHTLY scoring the yellow above the light should stop it from lifting outside the yellow.

It does not show well in the photos, but in addition to the crack above the headlight, the paint is separated along the seam between the yellow and red, going 1/2 way back towards the windshield.  I don't think the separation extends under the red at any point. 

[randgust]

Not that it's entirely related, but the real warbonnets were painted entirely yellow on the warbonnet - and then red over top with a ton of hand-masking with tape.   See "Route of the Warbonnets" by Joe McMillan to see the paint process.   That's why they aged out more 'orange' as the red paint faded - there's that yellow underneath.   It's also how the yellowbonnet got started - just skip that final coat of red.

Every once in a while a unit would start shedding the red....  http://www.railpictures.net/photo/52724/

Micro-scale has really first-rate warbonnet decals also with the proper black edging if everything goes wrong, and it's far easier to decal than paint over top of red.   You'll pile on way too much paint trying to get that color saturation to match.

[thomasjmdavis]

@randgust- that is the way I've usually painted yellow- white prime the whole thing, then yellow, then any other color. Otherwise the color below bleeds through sooner or later.  I have noted that C&EI in at least some cases painted their orange first, then blue over that- letterboards, for instance, were at least sometimes painted orange, and the lettering was "negative space" in the blue that was painted over- at least that is the way it looks in the photos.  The yellow on the model is clearly pretty thick- difficult to tell from decal film.

I think you are right- if I need to touch up edges, a decal would be the way to go.  It would also cover better if body putty comes into the picture (lets hope not)

Yellow is hard to make opaque. The last lead based paint I ever saw on sale was yellow for sign work.  The lead was in the pigment and covered better than any other pigment, or so they told me at the paint store.

While yellow bleeding through is no doubt what turned Warbonnet red to orange in the late 60s, my understanding is that the original red (pre WW2) was more orange than the red used in the 50s and 60s. 

[garethashenden]

Not that it's entirely related, but the real warbonnets were painted entirely yellow on the warbonnet - and then red over top with a ton of hand-masking with tape.   See "Route of the Warbonnets" by Joe McMillan to see the paint process.   That's why they aged out more 'orange' as the red paint faded - there's that yellow underneath.   It's also how the yellowbonnet got started - just skip that final coat of red.

Every once in a while a unit would start shedding the red....  http://www.railpictures.net/photo/52724/

Micro-scale has really first-rate warbonnet decals also with the proper black edging if everything goes wrong, and it's far easier to decal than paint over top of red.   You'll pile on way too much paint trying to get that color saturation to match.

I think that's how EMD did yellow/gold on all their units. Here's a B&M GP7 that has lost most of the maroon top coat. You can also see the gold wearing away on the stripes revealing the grey primer underneath. http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2616305

[mcjaco]

I think that's how EMD did yellow/gold on all their units. Here's a B&M GP7 that has lost most of the maroon top coat. You can also see the gold wearing away on the stripes revealing the grey primer underneath. http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2616305

Soo was the same way during their maroon and gold scheme.

[peteski]

No doubt that light colors like yellow, or even red, need to have light colored base to show the true color. But you can successfully paint them over darker colors if you first put down a coat of white primer (as white primer is very opaque). That will result in a perfect base for the yellow.  But if possible then of course is it recommended to paint the lightest colors first (over light colored base).  I suspect that is how the model we are dealing with here was painted.

[tehachapifan]

That is really odd. I have never seen a factory-painted model paint separate from the bare plastic....

I have an early-run Atlas SD50, SD60 and SD60M that had some factory paint cracking and chipping/flaking where it separated from the bare plastic too. It's been a while, but I think this was exacerbated by some oil that may have migrated onto the shell as well. My later run SD50/60 units have not had this issue. I've also noticed that at least more recent (undecorated) Atlas shells have a very fine texture to them when you look at them under some magnification. I'm assuming this was done to help with paint adhesion(?). I'm not sure if the earlier run SD50/60's had this texture or not or if that played a part in the cracking/flaking issue I had. At any rate, with my units that had some cracking and flaking, I removed what was loose, cleaned the area to remove any oil and then touched-up the paint as best as I could. Not perfect but hard to notice if you're not looking for it. The idea of gluing-down the lifted piece on the above model sounds like an interesting idea.

[peteski]

I have an early-run Atlas SD50, SD60 and SD60M that had some factory paint cracking and chipping/flaking where it separated from the bare plastic too. It's been a while, but I think this was exacerbated by some oil that may have migrated onto the shell as well. My later run SD50/60 units have not had this issue. I've also noticed that at least more recent (undecorated) Atlas shells have a very fine texture to them when you look at them under some magnification. I'm assuming this was done to help with paint adhesion(?). I'm not sure if the earlier run SD50/60's had this texture or not or if that played a part in the cracking/flaking issue I had. At any rate, with my units that had some cracking and flaking, I removed what was loose, cleaned the area to remove any oil and then touched-up the paint as best as I could. Not perfect but hard to notice if you're not looking for it. The idea of gluing-down the lifted piece on the above model sounds like an interesting idea.

Yes, I've seen paint flaking off the plastic shells on really old models (like an Arnold/rapido Diesel I have from the '60s, but not an a recently-made model.  As far as gluing paint back, I built a 1:24 scale car and a chip of paint came off its A-pillar. Since it could be fitted back into the spot it came out of, I used some glue to put it back.  Unless I told you where it was and you looked at it using a magnifier, you would never tell that the paint chopped there.  It sure beat stripping and repainting the model!

As far as the fine surface texture of the shell goes, I suspect that this is due to the fact that the factory did not polish the molds after they were made using the now-popular EDM process. That process leaves a slightly rough texture which used to be polished out smooth, but recently I see more and more examples of the molds not being polished. I guess it is cheaper to leave them in the raw and the paint covers up that roughness.

I'm also wondering of the manufacturers are starting to use the newer water-based acrylic paints which don't quite have the "tooth" of the older organic-solvent-based (smelly) paints.  So the paint can now chip easier.

[thomasjmdavis]

Good news and bad news.  Bad news is that the chip broke off (I was trying to lift it a couple hundredths in order to get a needle in with some adhesive).  But good news is I got a better look.  @peteski  was pretty close in his first post- the separation IS between the plastic body and first layer of paint.  Appears the entire model was painted silver, yellow on top of that.  No evidence of red under the yellow.  And from what I can see, the red is over silver as well (rather than yellow).  The separation is between the silver and the plastic.  This leads me to wonder if a bit of mold release was not removed, or a finger touched the nose in the factory while it was being masked.

Other good news- Intermountain has offered to touch up the paint UNDER WARRANTY.  Those folks take their warranty seriously, if they are willing to do work like that a decade or so after making the product (not really sure of the timeline, but pretty sure this was from IM's first run of F3s).  I don't think I will take them up on it, if only because I could see the problem getting worse with shipping to Colorado and back, but I am really impressed by the offer. 

Have effected a repair based on a combination of several ideas from folks here.  Since the loose paint had chipped off, I cleaned the bare plastic and the back of the chip with a Qtip and low VOC nail polish remover.  Brushed the bare plastic area with the closest yellow I had- Model Master Insignia yellow (acrylic) and used the paint as adhesive and put the chip back in place.  Pressed it in place with another Qtip, and wiped it down around the edges with one more damp (with water) Qtip to get any bits of extra paint squeezing out around the edges.  Looks pretty good so far. 

Using paint as an adhesive is a trick I used frequently when repairing stage sets and displays.  The end result isn't perfect, but certainly passes the 3' rule.

[thomasjmdavis]

Final result- under magnification- or macro photo, it is discern-able, but under my bifocals at a distance of 12", I can't see it.  If and when I get to "light weathering" (I am modeling 1950s- these guys got washed every few days) it should blend in well enough. 



Thanks to everyone who offered help, advice and educational commentary (even if off topic).