getting ready to paint the wheels of an LAV (trumpy tires esci body) and just wanted to cover the do's and don'ts before I stick both feet in. Any suggestions are welcome.
I have washed the tires with soap and water and rinsed well. I am planning on spraying the hubs first then masking those and shooting the tires with Tamiya acrylics. Lemme know. . . .

Whatever you do, don't paint them straight flat black. THat just doesn't look right.

Here's what I do on the few kits that have had vinyl tires. Sand the tires with a fine grit sandpaper. This will remove the shine and give the paint something to stick to.

Next, rubber isn't black. I've noticed that some tires have a brown tinge to them. SOme have a gray tint. So, take some Tamiya NATO Black (sorry, can't remember the number). Mix it with either brown or light gray, ratio about 10 parts black to 1 part brown or gray. See which you prefer.

Steve;
I have a good black rubber that i have mixed up with both brown and grey in it. I guess what I am looking for is trying to avoid the melting, peeling and cracking that I have read about here. Should I prime them first or just shoot with paint?

Damon, vinyl is the only case in which i use (holding) primer. Prime the tires with plastic primer or at least a flat enamel colour, thinned with a pretty aggressive thinner first. In this case priming really makes sense because acrylics tend to chip off from vinyl, especially from some tracks. Even some enamels do that sometimes.

I always use CHEAP plastic primer from our lokal hardware stores. It dries thin and improves the adhesion of the acrylics significantly. Still not enough for some "mechanical strain" but the colour stays on the vinyl when mounting tracks for example and doesn't chip off or get cracked after some slight bending around idler wheels and spockets or a little stretching.

Of course tires don't get the same strain like tracks but putting them on the rims or, changes of temperature and the loss of plasticizers over the years may cause the paint to come off some day anyway.

Please note that you should do a little test first when you plan to apply a wash to the tires later. Some thinners (yes, even WhiteSpirits!) may have a bad influence on the primer you know...

Up to you. I've never primed vinyl and I've never had issue with the paint peeling and I use acrylics.

Although it's a different material, i'd suggest 'painting' them in a PVA type adhesive. This will 'key' the surface and aovid any (possible) problems of flaking paint.

Years and years ago, when painting PVC-type figures, painting them was a disaster as enamel would just drop off them. What we did was to paint them with Unibond, a PVA type glue and they would hold ANY enamel.

Personally, with vinyl, i'd be careful of using ANY enamels whatsoever and use only acrylics.

That's a pretty interesting strategy! Never heard of it before. I think i have to try it out at the next opportunity. Thanks for the "inspiration"!

I'm facing exactly this question as I wrap up my Hobby Boss SdKfz 223 - lovely kit, BTW - save that it does have these pretty good-looking vinyl tires... and I've read all sorts of "doom and gloom" stuff on various threads about the black vinyl tire and tracks that some kits come with.

So what to do? Bear in mind that this is an experiment to me as I have never dealt with these vinyl things before ...

The dead black has got to go.... so I'm thinking of giving the tires a good soap n water washing followed by alcohol to remove all grease and oils, followed by some light sanding to gently roughen. I plan to then add a little color by washing with some burnt umber oils in turps. This should shift the black a little . I think that the oil paint itself may remain rather more pliable and resilient over the years and it could be more stable in this application as compared to acryls or most enamels. At the same time, the details and surface texture will not be obscured as may happen by heavier paint coats.

IF the color-shift is not "enough", I'll hit it with another oils wash - maybe a slightly lightened tint...

I plan to finalize the tires by dusting them with pastel chalk - this will well-emulate dirt and dust and can be worked into the treads much like the real thing.

As a test, I did this series (B. umber oil wash, lighter grey oil wash, a couple of chalk dusting runs) on some flat-black-enamel- painted styrene tires on a recent Horch 1A project.... not vinyl, but color-wise similar so maybe this could work for me / you? Here is a pic showing the outcome:



Bob