Hello I have the dragon kit with seperate track sections and need some info on track color. As it is now all the sections, approximately 150, are MM acrylic steel. I was thinking of putting sections together, top, bottom , etc. then washing or drybrushing to rust and dirty them up a bit. Whats the best way, wash. I have weathered aircraft with pastels but never done a wash. My T34 will be painted green, using rattle can as my airbrush is not up and running yet, no compressor. Any help on how to wash, make one and apply would be appreciated. Thanks---John

I'd paint them a dark brown, and weather from there.
See here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/doodle_m/222787937/

Use metal to drybrush the area's in contact with the ground.

Hope that helps.

Hey John,

I paint my tracks leather red. A light color. Then i go darker with washes and pigments. When its to dark, go lighter with pigments and dont be affraid to experiment with mud pigments and mud washes.

If you paint your tank green, i would go for the color "reflective green" from vallejo paints (no. 70890). If you have the ak/vallejo collor set 4 bo green i wil go for that one. Before the wash i do a filter to tone the bright green color down. The filter contains 10/ 15 % color and 90/ 85% thinner. Your wash contains 25/30% of paint and 75% thinner. The wash is preffered to go arround bolts and other details. The wash is mostley made of enamel paints. Paint chips i made of a mix of blackbrown and dark grey.

Hope you find it a bit usefull and got you on the right track.

Regard,

Remco

Factory and shiny metal (steel) color, then wet, muddy, snowy area and oxygen (air) benefits after rusty.
However, where the track meets with other substances, there metal polished.
In such places: the track grip nails, line rollers, chain-wheel-drive track meets, baffle plates (combs, tooth).
Perhaps the earthy, muddy soil in some places it may stick in the winter, the snowy parts of the vehicle while it is moving, and the desert entirely glossy csiszolódik and then, once rust starts.

Today's chain of bases involved, heat treated, surface treated.
They are also colored brown or blackish.
In use, it can wear, where wear, rust as well.

Thanks for the answers and recipe for wash. Can I do a wash of enamel over acrylic paint? I painted enamel over acrylic once before and the acrylic paint bubbled and blistered. Will the same happen with the wash?---John

Therefore be preceded by the lacquered surface to protect it.

I put a few sections together then painted them a red brown over their already aluminum, on the outside and did a red brown wash on the inside. I used a black wash over the red brown outside and highlighted high spots with a pencil to give the worn metal look. I made washes with 30% acrylic paint and 70% Isopropyl alcohol (thinner). I used Tamiya acrylic paints, red brown was "Linoleum".
Not too bad for a first try, got pretty much the earth-grunge look on outside, inside I'm not sure.---John

I don't know if you want to go through the trouble, but those circles in the flat surface, I believe, are mold ejection marks, and should be sanded flat.

Thanks for the heads up Jesse. If you mean the circles on the bottom picture that's the inside of the track that will never be seen. It's a build for me and for fun, not for a customer or museum. I want to learn techniques before I attempt anything like that. Just sprayed turret green.---John

One of the most BORING and ANNOYiNG flaw which has to be correct

Anyway it looks clean and nice so far John

Thanks Mauro, it makes no sense why they put those annoying ejection mold marks there. You'd think a kit detailed as well as this one is could use CADD and figure out somewhere else that would be less noticeable, but then again it's part of the game, I guess.---John

Decaled the turret and assembled one set of road wheels. I washed the lower hull and wheels in a brown wash. I am going to wash the upper hull and turret but in a more diluted wash, not as heavy.---John

I just restarted this after working on some other projects. Whats the best sequence to applying the tracks? Do the top then go around the drive wheels or do the bottom then go up?---John

I found an article by Cookie Sewell on the Academy 1/35 T34-76 with a good method for applying the treads. It seems to be working good so far. I still have a lot of touch up. The hull is not attached to the chassis yet, it still needs painting.---John

Hi John

Everybody got they own techniques to do indi tracks, I learned mine from old Osprey modelling book ,,Modelling T-34/76 & T-34/85,, Modelling manuals 16, it works ok for so far, but lately though I swiched to AM tracks...

First side done. Definitely needs some touch up on the wash.---John

Both sides done. Now to finish hull.---John

I finished putting on small parts, latches,brackets, lights, clevises on the hull which need to be painted the main color. I also gave the tracks a black wash to tone down the mud color.It is now ready for the paint booth to finish with the main color.---John

I have the hull painted and weathered. The right side is done, all the spare tracks and tie downs are on I also installed the tow cables and the headlights on the front hull. All thats left is the spare tracks on the right side, the machine gun in the front hull and some weathering of exhaust and smoke around the exhausts and barrel.---John