Here's a quick buildup of some of the parts I was experimenting with last week. Can't believe it's the weekend again already! So last time I messed around with different base coats (different colors and types of paint) to see what basecoats looked best. Then covered 'em with Alclad II chrome lacquer to see how it looked. Not being satisfied with that I got out some of my trusty Tamiya Acrylics--and I have to say now that I **love** Tamiya paints--to see what effect they had when applied over the whole shabang.
Reading up on this the consensus seems to be: don't bother putting clears or whatever over Alclad--if you're after home-grown chrome it just undoes whatever effect you're after. Not being sidelined by this sort of thing--ever--I went to work on it anyway. Note that I wanted to try Duplicolor lacquer clear over some of the Alclad but I was fresh out and didn't have time to go to Kragen to buy more so this didn't get done. Oh well.
Anyway, as you can see, the results of this week's model madness are quite colorful--probably too colorful. As I said last time (below) every part you see here, except for the stack which is right off
an old MPC kit, and the valve covers from a Revell Parts Pack, was basecoated with a different color, airbrushed with Alclad II chrome, and then finished with some sort of acrylic.
As a control, the transmission was Alclad II chrome over thick gloss black enamel. It came out looking chromey but I had some pock-mark issues. Not sure why. It's not too bad though.
The engine block was Tamiya Red over the Alclad II. No problems there. No eating, peeling, or running--it covered the Alclad II right up.
Tamiya clear yellow acrylic was used on oil pan, which had a silver enamel undercoat. The result is a decent looking, but not perfect, sort of "gold chrome" you might see on a show custom or low rider. I am not fully sure what I'd use this for, but, it's an interesting effect.
The heads came out in a way I didn't expect. First, the texture molded into the plastic came out looking too textured. I think it might make sense to sand down textured stuff before applying alclad, as you end up with too dramatic an effect.....you've probably read that alclad shows up every little bump and ding in the surface and this is true--but IMO it seems to me to magnify it, not just show it. Anyway, after letting the alclad II dry for a few hours I brushed on some Tamiya clear gloss acrylic. I have never heard this was a good idea, but as usual I did it anyway. This had the effect of making the basecoat (in this case, gold Testors enamel) show through more, and I ended up with an interesting metallic looking gold;not at all what I expected. And it seemed the more I brushed on the more basecoat showed through. I am not sure if I was rubbing off the alclad or some oddball chemical reaction was taking place, but the end result looks to me like neither alclad nor enamel paint. The end result looks pretty darn cool. With some practice I think you could get this looking a lot like cast metal that had some gold thrown in.
For the timing cover and starter I did the same thing, and got the same result--that the enamel undercoat showed through, but not all the way. The starter turned an odd green (undercoat) under chrome (Alclad) under gold (Tamiya Clear Yellow acrylic). The end result was an cross section of green and yellow, with a decidely metallic look to it. Fascinating, a sort of poor man's color morphing paint scheme.
The carb and manifold we done with and acrylic basecoat. As I said below, this isn't for everyone. The alclad basically didn't stick to the carb (Gloss black Tamiya acrylic) so it still looks black, although it did retain some silver highlights. The manifold, though, was one of the great triumphs of this week's experimentation. I think I already mentioned this, but here it is again: a flat black Tamiya undercoat, alclad II, followed a few hours later with Tamiya acrylic gloss clear. The result looks like cast pewter or something. It's a great effect, and one I am going to start using more.
Since the last post I have been doing a lot of reading about Alclad II chrome. Everyone has tried something odd with it and it seems like endless fun.
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