SPA Modeler

It's all looking good so far Kari. When painting aluminum surfaces such as intake manifolds or transmissions I lay down a coat of flat black and then shoot light coats of aluminum enamel over it until I get the right shade I'm after. I usually aim for just enough to make it a darkened shade of aluminum. I'll follow that up with a light (and I do mean light) hand brushing of ground up black pastel just to deepen the whole effect.
I'll show you the results here. I used this process on the transmission in the photo:

I like that look on the tranny. I may have to try that on some aircraft for a great weatherbeaten look. What did you do on the engine block here?

mustang1989 wrote:It's all looking good so far Kari. When painting aluminum surfaces such as intake manifolds or transmissions I lay down a coat of flat black and then shoot light coats of aluminum enamel over it until I get the right shade I'm after. I usually aim for just enough to make it a darkened shade of aluminum. I'll follow that up with a light (and I do mean light) hand brushing of ground up black pastel just to deepen the whole effect.
I'll show you the results here. I used this process on the transmission in the photo:

Thanks Joe for the advice!

As I have already painted the aluminium on and indeed it looks perhaps one step too shiny, could I sort of "reverse" the paint work, by adding a very very thin coat of smoke / flat black ?

- Kari

No problem at all bud. At the stage that you're at I'd be just applying a light overall coat of the ground up black pastel on it Kari. You'll be surprised at what it does.

Stikpusher wrote:I like that look on the tranny. I may have to try that on some aircraft for a great weatherbeaten look. What did you do on the engine block here?

I've always black based my engines whether it's aircraft or automotive engines. I was doing that on my own when I accidentally found that it's been being used for a while. I've found that it's easier when applying the base coat of color to go from a darker shade to a lighter shade than the other way around plus if it's done right you still get the shadowing effect from the black base paint. On this particular engine example, after black basing I went with a coat of metalizer aluminum from Testors and just buffed it out a little.

mustang1989 wrote:No problem at all bud. At the stage that you're at I'd be just applying a light overall coat of the ground up black pastel on it Kari. You'll be surprised at what it does.

Thanks Joe, I will try !

- Kari

mustang1989 wrote:

Stikpusher wrote:I like that look on the tranny. I may have to try that on some aircraft for a great weatherbeaten look. What did you do on the engine block here?

I've always black based my engines whether it's aircraft or automotive engines. I was doing that on my own when I accidentally found that it's been being used for a while. I've found that it's easier when applying the base coat of color to go from a darker shade to a lighter shade than the other way around plus if it's done right you still get the shadowing effect from the black base paint. On this particular engine example, after black basing I went with a coat of metalizer aluminum from Testors and just buffed it out a little.

Thanks for that information. I like the darker beat up look in the tranny, but the block looks great too. With the common starting point of black, I see that a multi tone look is easily achieved afterwards.

Kari: Looking forward to the results.

Carlos: Yeah and with the addition of the black pastel powder more results can be achieved with a lot more control.

Here's a picture of a transmission that I took in my shop today that was brand new in the crate and you can still pick up some dark undertones in the paint.............particularly in the crevices. It's great to have 1:1 references at your very fingertips.

ok, I used some black pigment, carefully brushed and additionally some tiny tiny drops of a thinner and pigment mix.

It's darker for sure, it's better for sure. But next time I do an engine, I will put thinner layers of Aluminium color on, as you Joe advised.



- Kari

Man that looks ALOT better Kari!!!