how soon can i paint a darker enamel over a lighter enamel ?

[BERT aka MODEL MAKER]

I need to paint a dark brown over a light tan , i had to add a light coat of light tan on a base of the light tan that is a week old because i used a plastic bowl to mask a circle and moving the bowl around to get even measurement created a shiney ring on the light tan under the plastic bowl so i resrayed a light coat of the tan to cover up the shiney spots. if i were to spray a coat or two of clear flat (model master) would that help prevent the light tan from marking up like it did ? and if i do use the clear, what is the MINIMUM amount of time i have to wait to use it over the light tan i sprayed an hour ago, and how long after spraying the clear laquer do i have to wait before spraying the gloss brown enamel on top of that ? thanks for the help i am on a timeline here and falling behind

[Mr. Badwrench]

You don't have to wait for it to cure, but you should at least wait for it to dry. And that depends on how thick you sprayed it. If you need to mask over the lighter color, then you will need to wait for it to cure. Overnight is usually good enough, and four or five hours may be ok. But the shorter you wait, the more likely the masking material will pull up the base coat.

If the bowl you used to mask the circle with left a "shiny ring", it probably just polished the surface a bit. You could get around that by polishing the rest of the surface. I've heard of people using newspaper to do this, but I've always been afraid to try this. I'm afraid it'll leave newsprint ink on my paintjob. I use a cotton ball, or a q-tip, or an old t-shirt. I hear diapers work well too.

[BERT aka MODEL MAKER]

i tried a clean soft towel but nothing removed the shiney marks and if the light tan circle looked entirely like that it would look terrible, so i just gave a light coat of the same color and it covered them up. the enamel cans says respray within 3 hours or wait 48, besides i spray in the garage and then cover my work with a clean box, but i keep finding tiny black hairlike stuff on the painted surface that will come off with no problem once the paint is dry and gently rubbed or wiped off with a towel. I am thinking this stuff is from the gas furnace and is suspended in the air in the garage and is forced down on the painted surface by the spraying. i tried removing this stuff once before , before the paint was dry on that same part and ended up with marked up surface so now i wait till dry. will spraying clear flat laquer once the flat enamel is dry protect the painted surface from these shiney scuffs and how soon can i paint the darker enamel over the clear flat laquer ??? thanks for the help, this floor circle is starting to drive me CRAZY

[Lt. Z0mBe]

i tried a clean soft towel but nothing removed the shiney marks and if the light tan circle looked entirely like that it would look terrible, so i just gave a light coat of the same color and it covered them up. the enamel cans says respray within 3 hours or wait 48, besides i spray in the garage and then cover my work with a clean box, but i keep finding tiny black hairlike stuff on the painted surface that will come off with no problem once the paint is dry and gently rubbed or wiped off with a towel. I am thinking this stuff is from the gas furnace and is suspended in the air in the garage and is forced down on the painted surface by the spraying. i tried removing this stuff once before , before the paint was dry on that same part and ended up with marked up surface so now i wait till dry. will spraying clear flat laquer once the flat enamel is dry protect the painted surface from these shiney scuffs and how soon can i paint the darker enamel over the clear flat laquer ??? thanks for the help, this floor circle is starting to drive me CRAZY

Could you airbrush a coat of Future over the whole area? It should even out the shininess.

Z0mBe

[Jonas Calhoun]

I hear diapers work well too.

Yeah, but you don't want the polishing compound. BTW--I've used newsprint before on polishing, and it works OK, but there are better things out there--you don't want to use the stuff with ink on it though, go to a packing store, they have oodles of the stuff cheap.

Anyway, I personally wait a long time between coats. It started out because I didn't have time to paint a lot, and it would go a week or so between coats. Really noticed a difference though in the toughness of my paintjobs. I realize you said you were on a time schedule, but maybe next time...

As to cure time and drying time, the big thing to remember as Badwrench said, is to use compatible paint if you are only waiting for drying time. Enamels, lacquers, acrylics, etc. really need to be cured if they have different topcoats.

Dan

[BERT aka MODEL MAKER]

i resprayed a light coat of the original color that got the shiney marks on it to cover the shiney ring i did that last night, the paint underneath is over a week old the light top coat is new. the original layer of paint is MM light tan enamel, the color i have to put on top of that after i use the bowl as a mask to preserve a circle of the light tan is MM gloss brown, also an enamel. so enamel on enamel. I just have to get that bowl/mask evenly placed so the circle will not be off center the circle diameter is suppossed to be exactly 5 3/16ths " those shiney marks really looked awful and i do need to move the bowl around to get it even on all 4 sides. if i were to get the shiney spots next time, could i go ahead and leave em then spray the dark brown color and then when the whole thing is dry spray a clear FLAT laquer over the entire thing ? would the clear flat erase the shiney spots or just dull them down to where they will still be visable?

[Warped Speedster]

If you're using flat paints you can always sand away little scuffs and "Shinny" marks. Use some 800 or 1200 grit wet and dry paper. (very lightly off course, you don't want to go through the paint finish). I do this quite often as I handle a model during the painting and finishing process.

Actually, I usually lightly micro sand an entire model down to get rid of the "tooth" in the paint. It removes the dust particles and scuffs, and makes decal application a lot easier too. (You will obviously need to devote some time to this task)

After sanding, wash the surface clean with a big (soft) paint brush and a cup of water. This cleans the surface and gives the model a nice even finish. You can (brush buff) a surface to the desired finish by how much and how long to do it.

Caution. It will turn a flat paint job into a semigloss finish if you buff too much. Which is OK too if that's the desired look you want. I think it looks kinda cool that way myself.

A side note: I would think using a hard edge (like a bowl) to mask a models surface would inherently lead to a marred edge. There's gotta be a better safer way to do this for your application, like masking tape. Just a thought.

[BERT aka MODEL MAKER]

now that i kinda know where the bowl needs to sit i hopefully won't need to move it much now that i am aware of what pressure and movement on it can do i doubt that i could make a perfect circle thats exactly 5 3/16ths all the way around with nice edges

[BERT aka MODEL MAKER]

with just masking tape, the bowl looks like it sit flat all the way around but i am going to test it on cardboard first to see if any paint gets underneath.