A Quick Paint Job for Toby

My MG Models "Toby" tram has now received a quick (by my standards) paint job into an appropriate colour scheme.  In fact, from primer to varnish only took a week, but that is more down to luck than anything else.

Prior to priming most of the bodywork was prepared with Birchwood Casey gun blue in order to promote adhesion and hide any future accidental chipping.  The parts were then scrubbed clean for a final time and dried off with a hairdryer.  At the point of priming (using Halfords grey primer) the body, underframe, roof and interior were separate units.  The day after priming the body was sprayed with Halfords Ford 'Tuscan Beige' to get the wooden colour.  Whilst this was drying the roof and underframe units were brush painted with acrylics.  Prior to varnishing the body and underframe were Araldited together.  Varnishing used Testors 'Dulcote' - my first experience of this product and a satisfactory flat finish.

Whilst the exterior was being painted, the interior had a different approach to painting.  The grey undercoat was used as a base, over which I ran a wash of black acrylic paint to sit in the recesses and detail. Once this was dry I dry brushed the engine block with a metalic acrylic shade, ans picked out various details such as air tanks with solid colour.  Once everything was varnished the interior was stuck into the body using Evo-stick.  The roof was then located into position (I had added bent lengths of wire in each corner to locate it), then held in place with elastic bands and Araldite carefully applied to the inside corners and points along the sides/ends.

All that remains to do is to add a little weathering.  Actually, a little more weathering, as can be seen in the pictures, a weathering wash was used over the beige part of the model before varnishing in order to pick out the planking and the recesses of the framework.

Colin