What to back finished paintwork with?
 

What's the best stuff to protect the paint, I mainly use water based stuff but occasionally use a bit of Pactra paint so would need to work with both,
And how long do you leave your paint to cure before applying protective finish?

Cheers for your input.

me - 2 days to cure, then 4 or 5 really light coats of Plastikote, blasted with a hairdryer in between.

Cheers for the reply Andy what version of Plastikote are you using?

this one...

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8506/8...c9596a8b34.jpg
Untitled by eterrier, on Flickr

at the very least 24hrs after finishing and thats 24hrs on the radiators, then 2 very light coats of clear plasticoat no more or it adds lots of weight and can get brittle

must be a difference in each coats Carl - I've had no brittleness and the shells aren't unduly heavy either.

When I say "a coat", I mean one swing of the spray can. Apply two much at once and the plastikote attacks the paint.

Each of my coats is seriously light !

Andy

Andy

Where did you buy that big can of plast-kote from ?

er.... Halfords lacquer. Saw an 8th scale shell from nearly a year ago, used most weekends and the paint was damn near 100%. Lexan had failed in all sorts of places!!

Can't remember pal !! It's lasted me so long, cos my coats are soooooo light !! :p

Screwfix maybe.

flea bay for me

Interesting.

Since switching to createx paints - I've found that the shells need quit a lot of coats to properly cover / seal them. A couple of light coats is nothing and will not protect / seal the shell ?

The idea is to fully seal it and also waterproof it.

Andy - ill have a closer inspection of yours on Sunday. I saw Jordan's and it looked like there was a very decent coating on it - looked pretty thick to me !

only ever done two lightish coats, done 100s of shells andy 1/8th 1/5th scale etc and never ever had a complaint about it being washed off may be your water based paint is to thick when ur spraying it if it needs 4 coats of laquer to cover it pal, dont always use palsticoat ether halfords laquer does the same job for a third the price

Next time you see me Carl - please show me one of your shells - id be very interested to see how the inside looks :)

Cheers.
Andy

smooth as a babys bum andy lol

what a set of nerds we are!

:thumbsup:

lol paint geeks

Been thinking about setting up a forum specifically for UK painters to share tips and stuff (like the old CFX.com). I rather like PaintGeeks.com, mind if I nick it:lol:

sounds ok to me send us a link when ur done
paintgeeks like it go ahead

Just to add something a little different in, I ran out of plastikote so I had a dig around in my garage and come across this ....

http://i1055.photobucket.com/albums/...ps5c1579b8.jpg

It smells the same so I give it ago, it seems all good. I'm not that sure how much cheaper it is than plastikote tho.

On the time left for backing I back mine pretty much straight after the paint job, I know people say you should let the paints dry out ect but I have been doing it like this for a while now with no ill affect, I just don't go to heavy on the first coat and flash off inbetween with a hair dryer, giving 2 or 3 coats in total ...

Ha Ha.

Being geeky about something is good - always aiming for perfection :)

I might try the Lidel stuff my other half bought if that old can of gear was ok Andy ;)

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/15062770/fix.jpg

I imagine it's all the same kind of stuff.