finally figured out how to paint

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AfterBurners

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Started painting my Snarky kit and I always seem to have issues with over spray especially with wing type kits. The airframe gets over spray and the wings stay wet or vice verse. Well after a few coats and the last being wet I laid down an ok paint job. It's far from being finished. I still need to cut in the red but for the most part I'm good with it. After I shoot the clear and wet sand and polish it should look good. I'll put up some finished pictures. I built the kit pretty much stock with the exception of a LOC 24mm motor tube and lite ply rings and yeah I forgot I ordered better airframe tubes. The brown glassine type, instead of using the paper thin tubes that come with the kit. Hopefully I'll be able to squeeze some more flights out of this.

I think next on the build list will either be a 3 or 4" version.
 
That looks outstanding. Did you figure out any new techniques to get around the problems you had before? Asking for a friend...

Yes actually I did. Of course after doing all the primer and body work I prepped it for paint. I use denatured alcohol and a paper towel to wipe everything down and then allowed it to dry which really doesn't take long. I also like to set the paint out in the sun light to warm the can.

I always start painting the edge of all the wings and fins first. I give them at least 2-3 coats.

After it dries I spray a light tack coat on the entire rocket rotating it as I go. I'm not actually trying to cover any one area just doing a light mist with in a few inches of the surface,

After it dries I come by and starting on the underside I paint the wings and stabilizers first. Using smooth fluid strokes. After that I continue on with the same motion and paint the airframe and nose. All one fluid smooth stroke, keeping the paint coming out as I extent past the nose cone and the aft section of the airframe. Pretty much how you see those machines paint cars.

Keeping the distance the same at all times and the speed.

As I rotate the rocket around I paint the sides exactly the same top to bottom. When I reach the topside I paint the tops of the wings and stabilizers and like I did on the underside I come back and paint the airframe.

That's the first real coat. I let it dry for about 10 minutes and then repeat the process. Each time I slow the motion down just a little to allow the paint to "WET" itself and flow. I guess that's the big secret knowing how fast and close you can get without running the finish. I'm usually 2-3" when I'm laying down the main coats of paint. The tack coat I'm about 4" or so away from the surface and not really trying to cover it.

I let the rocket dry at least a week or longer, before I even consider handling it. I don't like rushing it and it's not like I'm gonna launch anytime soon.

Then I'll come back and cut in the red and then after the red is painting and I unmask the rocket I'll laid down several coats of clear starting lite to medium and build up the finish. Although I should probably put on the decals first, but I need to test them and see how they will react to the clear coat.

SPECIAL NOTE: I only use Duplicolor primer and paints. The nozzle is adjustable so you can spray a nice fan vertically as you see how I have it position on a wood dowel and I used center rings that fit the motor mount tube.
 
That looks really good, very smooth. Wet sanding that should go pretty easy. You're right that the trick to get an even wet coat without runs is spraying at the right distance and the right speed. The only way to learn is with practice. If you're spraying Duplicolor rattle cans at 2" to 3", that is really close. I don't think you could get away with spraying that close if it was metallic paint because you would get an uneven pattern.
 
That looks really good, very smooth. Wet sanding that should go pretty easy. You're right that the trick to get an even wet coat without runs is spraying at the right distance and the right speed. The only way to learn is with practice. If you're spraying Duplicolor rattle cans at 2" to 3", that is really close. I don't think you could get away with spraying that close if it was metallic paint because you would get an uneven pattern.

Probably more like 3" and getting the speed down is important.
 
This is still in base coat. He said he has yet to lay clear.

Yeah good point. But when I've had problems with orange peel it's always been the base coat that is bumpy. As long as my base coats go down smooth then it is still smooth after clear coat. Maybe because clear is much thinner than color paint. At least with the paint I use, the colors gets thinned 1:1 while the clear gets thinned 1:2.
 
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Got the red painted and now ready for the decals. Overall I enjoyed building the kit. I did make some changes. I upgraded to the better brown glassine body tubes. I also used a LOC motor tube and I'll probably down size to 24" chute. The fit of the nose cone is my biggest issue with this kit. If you're spending over $40 for a kit you would think Apogee can figure out how to size the nose cone to fit their body tubes. Would I build this again. Nope! I might do an upscale to a 3 or 4" version using better quality parts but I would never buy this kit or any of the Dynastar kits again. I have a Lexxjet that I bought with Snarky and I'm already seeing issues with it. Just gonna put it away and forget I even bought it.
 
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