Bill,
I've had failures and successful projects with all types of paints.
Floquil seems to be my choice based on history (finally finished my last
square bottle about 2 years ago). I've never had an issue with their
paint not covering. However, for a near gloss finish I used
glaze+thinner+paint in roughly equal portions. I've never used gloss
and crystal coat of old gave me bad results.
I also like much of what Scale Coat gives me but it seems to show wear
faster than Floquil for some reason--you know, the areas like piping and
corners that start showing the brass edges. Scale coat does have the
disadvantage of a slower drying time that leaves the model subject to
dust and handling accidents during the painting process itself.
My only real disaster was with Star Brand Paints, however numerous
modelers swear by. It was slow in covering and the paint peeled during
the masking process. I'm told it's actually a printer's ink rather than
a pigmented paint. I've got a few bottles of it, so I need to
experiment with it again when I get some time. The colors themselves
were very good however. When I started to strip the messed-up job,
lacquer thinner removed nearly all the paint in a matter of seconds,
which probably means it will need to be sealed very well assuming to get
to stay on in the first place. I've had really old Floquil take weeks
in lacquer thinner to soften enough to began the repainting process, so
that old formula stuff must have been good.
There was a series of articles published in Mainline Modeler by a guy
who used only the pigments from our model paints who then mixed them
with automotive type lacquers to come up with a very durable paint. I
did two Overland FA's in a similar way. My attempt was a little
'grainy' but the durability was superb. I understand that many of these
products have had to be changed over the years but our cars really do
take a beating before the paint is worn off, so they are still doing
things right.
Bob Werre
PhotoTraxx
For over 20 years I have used Scalecoat for the car color and Floquil
weathering. I lost track of how many models I have painted - 99% of
which were brass -- but it is well over 500. Yesterday I started
painting some O Scale boxcars in Floquil because that is what I was
told to do. The cars were freshly blasted in my booth. Since I am
decaling I mixed 2 bottles of paint in with 1 bottle of high gloss.
Floquil does NOT COVER especially in the hard corners. I sprayed and
sprayed waiting for it to build and cover but it did not - at least to
my satisfaction. I was going to paint, bake and paint again to get
good coverage when I stopped saying this is just wrong. After some
campaigning I was able to switch to Scalecoat and completed painting
the cars to an excellent finish.
The best thing I could say about the Floquil paint is it came off in
the blast booth in record time -- much easier than the original clear
coat on the cars! I know that there are some other "newer" brands some
of which I have also recently used for the first time.
But for me I will stick to Scalecoat. It just works! I have goofed
that the last bottle of Scalecoat will be pried from my cold dead hands!
Thank You,
Bill Lane
