Model Railroading > Un-Doing Weathering, with help from TO

On 3/14 I posted some pix of how I had attempted to strip off dry powder weathering in case I would want that same car to be in photos set in an earlier time, with nearly new paint.
I was not happy with those results, but I got some good ideas from the people who resonded and with their advice now I like this result a lot more.
Washing it with Windex, (suggested by Lighter) and rinsing with plain water brought it back to a near-new appearance and now I am confident I can use that method on more cars. (first photo)
I then re-applied powder/chalk to make it look like it has been out on line for a decade or more. (second photo)
This car was a test mule, now off to some of those great Rapido, Tangent, and Moloco cars!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/24 22:00 by railstiesballast.

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Good to know. Did you have a chance to try Mineral spirits with the weathering powders? I've used wet water to make a paste with good results but if the paste could flow a little better, that would be good.

I bought a pint of mineral spirits (oderless) but have not worked with them yet.
By the way Joe Fugate, in his column in Model Railroad Hobbyist, recently recommended oderless mineral spirits for track cleaning, and I  want to try that.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/18/24 13:41 by railstiesballast.

railstiesballast Wrote:
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> I bought a pint of mineral spirits (oderless) but
> have not worked with them yet.
> By the was Joe Fugate, in his column in Model
> Railroad Hobbyist, recently recommended oderless
> mineral spirits for trackcleaning, and I  want
> to try that.

Yes and he had lots of data to back him up.  I've been doing it since his article and it cleans well. He also recommends following up with graphite.  I've had mixed results but I think it's more a product of my environment then anything. I'm resigned to have to constantly clean my track at this point. 

One thing the mineral spirits does when track cleaning is loosen all the gunk on your wheels. So be prepared to do multiple cleanings when you first start the treatment.

Thanks for the weathering info, or re-weathering.

Agree with the Mineral Spirits for track cleaning, also the quality of research put into the explanation for mineral spirits and also the graphite to reduce recurrance of the 'micro-arc ash'.

Note that it's easy to confuse the old school 'gunk' being removed with the application of graphite. Suggest just not appying the graphite until the hidden gunk goes away.