alclad

[Guest]

Hello,

I am about to dabble into the world of alclad. I was wondering if anyone has any tips on how to use it to its best and what to do and not to do. i have a little idea but any help would be so helpful. thank you for your time on this.

Cheers

Si

[stona]

It's all about the preparation.

Alclads will show up any blemish.

For anything except a highly polished finish I prime with my normal Halfords grey plastic primer. For the highly polished aluminium,chrome etc you need a gloss black primer. Alclad do one but I've used Humbrol gloss black. Whatever you use make sure it is thoroughly dry and cured. Alclad is very "hot" being laquer based and can attack primers.

Alclad sprays very well,no need to thin. Don't apply a heavy coat,just mist it on and build it up gradually. You'll see the metallic finish appear before your eyes. It really is the easy bit.

Clean up with cellulose thinners. I use the generic stuff from Halfords.

Both the Alclad and the cellulose thinners are nasty stuff so plenty of ventilation and a mask are a must.

You should end up with a realistic looking metal finish like this.

Cheers

Steve

[Guest]

Thank you for this help. Im going to experiment on a couple 1/72 models (mig-15 and a Sabre) its for a trump 1/32 lightning and im a bit worried about how to handle it when spraying the alclad. Should i hang it and spray it in one go. i would also love to add different patches of silvers say aluminium and another shade of the same(?) to make a kind of patchwork of panels on it. am i asking to much to do this. To get the finish that you have on your picture would be a dream. Thanks again Steve.

Cheers

Si

[AlanG]

Glad you asked this Simon. I've just ordered a few bottles from John lol

[Ian M]

In addition to the solid advice from Steve. When you mist it on, stop the minute you think its looking right. Give it a minute to dry (yes it dries that fast), have a look and see what you think. If you go at it full tilt, you might over do it and end up with a result that can be compared to "ordinary paint".

One of the 'fun' things with Alclad II is its ability to transmit light and the base it is painted on.

When I did my Lightning, I primed it in Grey and picked out several panels some with lighter, some with darker greys. Another fun thing is if you rum the primer down with a polishing cloth, this too will show in the final result. So you could rub panels in different directions, the resulting play on light will be very effective.

Then just for a final tweak you can also use some of the clear colours, to pick up some of the different panels. Blue, violet, green, brown, red... Its all good.

The thing is not to over do it.

Ian M

[Guest]

How did you handle it. someone has told me to handle it with cotton gloves also when you sprayed it did you hang it up how/what did you rest it on.

Thanks so much for the help.

cheers

si

[Ian M]

I painted it on a turn table, It was only the 1/48 scale one. I didn't use cotton gloves but I did make sure my hands where clean and dry. I did avoid handling it as much as possible, but quite frankly, Alclad is pretty tough stuff and once dry can be handled quite safely, just be careful of greasy fingers and you'll be fine.

Ian M

[Guest]

thank you

[stona]

I agree 100% with Ian's comments above.

For different panels you can mask Alclad. I use de-tacked Tamiya tape. I de-tack it just by sticking it to and removing it from my table two or three times. You don't have to rush out and buy several bottles of different Alclad shades. The difference between some of them is VERY slight. You can darken your standard shade by adding a drop or two of gloss black enamel paint to your paints cup. You can then control how much of a tint you want to add.

I have tried pre-shading but it didn't give the right effect. From some angles it was very strong but from others almost invisible! Very difficult to control.

For small models I try to spray them in one go. I usually attach a wire (old coat hangar) to a part not to be sprayed to act as a handle.

Cheers

Steve

[Andy2035]

Both the Alclad and the cellulose thinners are nasty stuff so plenty of ventilation and a mask are a must.

Cheers

Steve

Hmmm, so I guess using them in the kitchen isn't a great idea, think I'll stick to Vallejo for now...