Large Scale Central

The wash settled everywhere except the recessed planking lines.

Huh? The wash settled on the surface and not in the grooves? How does that happen?
Last night gave a wash to 3 small flats in G scale by Hartland Locomotive Works with intent for wash to settle in planking lines as washes do.
Except it didn’t.
The wash settled everywhere except the recessed planking lines.
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat?

Cars were primed with Duplicolor automobile primer.
Deck planking was given base coat of flat khaki Rustoleum spray paint.
Color effects were applied with 3 colors of acrylic craft paint.
planking was painted with Testors semi-gloss/satin Acryl clear since I many decades ago found doing that helps prevent wash from settling in texture of flat color instead of in grooves.

And the wash went and did exactly what I did all the previously successful things to prevent it from doing.

And indeed did prevent it from doing on the previous 9 cars of this type I’ve painted during the previous several years.

Forrest, if you want the grooves darker, take a rag and load it with some ink/paint, then rub it in. When you rub off the ink/paint you’ll leave behind as much or as little as you like in the grooves, and the grain of the “wood” will show up better also. It’s like drybrushing only with a rag and dark color. Paint might work better for you than ink, and you don’t need to worry about an unnatural shine because you’ll be using so little pigment.

Hope this helps.

Another solution is to flood instead of wash. Put the surface horizontal, flood it with dilute paint, and wipe off the excess on the planks with something stiff, like a wooden stick.

I’m not sure what the difference between a flood and a wash would be - if asked I would describe doing a wash as flooding the area with a wash.
Same as I do within the boundaries of fan and radiator grilles.

That rag thing would take some practice.

You know that thing about how the definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing and expect different results; I was doing the same thing and expecting the same results!

Though these are HO cars (because the picture was already available) I did for a club member, they illustrate the usual result of the process.

Wetting agents draw the liquid down into the corners … isopropyl alcohol or Ivory liquid soap in water… (a drop in a gallon)…

Yea, a drop of dish soap or some rubbing alcohol in the wash will help it flow into the recesses better. Also, I don’t usually try and wash over a gloss coat, because a thinned wash doesn’t really stick well to the shiny (smooth) areas. Although I do understand what you said about washing over flat paint tending to stick to the texture of the paint. That’s why, before my washes and weathering, I usually do a flat clear coat. That way the treatment has an even surface to adhere to, so it tends to behave in a more predictable manner.

Will remember these to experiment with for next time - might buy 3 more of the HLW mini ore tippers next month, am still 6 shy of the train of 18 desired.

Last night I went and used a 0.5mm mechanical pencil to draw in the grooves between planks. Now it looks the way I want. :slight_smile:

The previous 9 cars, which had decks painted to appear older and more weathered had the shading washes work fine but for some reason

on these 3 cars which I wanted to look newer the process malfunctioned.