Transparent Red Acryl Spray Cans?

Hey everybody,
once again - another project came to my mind - I´d like to make my F40 covering it in carbon fiber - like all the Enzos you see around on the board and cover it with transparent red. Since I don´t own an airbrush and don´t plan on getiing one, I´m pretty much stuck with Acrylic laquer spray cans. Is there any manufacturer who makes transparent red in spray cans, because I think that Tamiya does not offer this color in spray cans...

I appreciate every hint and help. Thanks in advance...

Robert

Tamiya offer's a Transparent Red in spray cans, it's TS-74 Clear Red in their Lacquer line of sprays. A lot of hobby shops don't carry it though because it's not one of the more popular/basic colors.

Dupli color got a transparent red. Dont know how good it is though

the red on the real F40 is transparent because the paint isn't 100% opaque.
transparent red isn't going to do what you want.
"normal" TS-8 is translucent enough if you don't drown the model.

the red on the real F40 is transparent because the paint isn't 100% opaque.
transparent red isn't going to do what you want.
"normal" TS-8 is translucent enough if you don't drown the model.

Alright, thanks for the information. I knew I could count on you guys!

You're talking about doing the bodywork, right?

I'm not sure I understand the look you're going for. I've seen CF body Enzo's here, but I don't think I've seen any overcoated with red afterwards.

If you cover the body in CF decals, spraying the body then with TS74 or TS8 will look very dark. TS8 requires a white basecoat to come out right- applying it over a near black base will look dramaticly different, and could easily come out dark brown instead.

Got any pics of what you're trying to do?

Also for the record, most of the bodywork on the F40 is not carbon fibre like the F50 or Enzo. On the F40, CF was used mostly on the cockpit tub. The F40 bodywork was done in Kevlar blend, and looks significantly different than CF.

and that is a very good point.
what he wants is to see the weave under the red paint as you can on a real F40.
perhaps what he needs is specially commisioned white/off grey decal pattern that he can use but not effect the resulting colour of the red.

Hmmm, I'm not sure we really know what he wants :confused: . Based on his first post he simply asked about spraying transparent red over CF decals. This would imply to me that he's more interested in seeing a red tint carbon fiber, similar to spraying smoke over CF to tone it down a bit and make it more realistic. I'm not sure that it's the texture of the fiber he wants to see as much as it is the color/tint of red CF that he wants to see.

Let's ask him... LOL :grinyes: .. Robert, what look is it that you're trying to achieve? It may make it easier to suggest a solution.

Hmmm, I'm not sure we really know what he wants :confused: . Based on his first post he simply asked about spraying transparent red over CF decals. This would imply to me that he's more interested in seeing a red tint carbon fiber, similar to spraying smoke over CF to tone it down a bit and make it more realistic. I'm not sure that it's the texture of the fiber he wants to see as much as it is the color/tint of red CF that he wants to see.

Let's ask him... LOL :grinyes: .. Robert, what look is it that you're trying to achieve? It may make it easier to suggest a solution.

I see that I wasn´t "clear" :lol: :lol: :lol: about what I´m trying to achieve. I saw all these Enzo´s being done with a body covered in Carbon Fiber. I know that there is and was no F40 in this particular style but I know that the F40´s body was produced Kevlar (I will sort the color of the Kevlar out in detail, since I have enough reference about the F40).
In result I want to cover the body of the F40 with decals reassembling this Kevlar-style and then cover it (for protection and shine). So I need a red acrylic lacquer through which - once applied - you can see the structure of the Kevlar-decal. So I guess I´m looking for some sort of tint of red over the compound-decal (basically like applying smoke or clear lacquer). I was worried about the result being too dark. So I´m close to going with yellow/black Kevlar decals...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v239/knobi23232/SM_1320.jpg
With a red tint, it should go into some sort of dark orange color...

But now I´m confused. Should I use light coats of TS-8 oder give the red translucent shine of TS-74. My feeling goes into the latter direction so that the compound decals really show their structure.

I hope that this was more understandable. And sorry for causing misinterpretations.

Robert

It's an interesting idea, but I strongly suspect that it may not turn out as you hope.

The SMS kevlar is a good choice for representing unpainted body parts for the F40. However, if you overspray it with red, the color you get will be brown. The kevlar decal is essentially tiny rectangles of yellow and black. From any distance, it's color is olive green (what you get when you mix yellow and black- try it). If you cover olive green with red, you're going to get brown- and it may not be a particullarly attractive shade of brown. It's not going to very well represent a Rosso Corsa finish, and it may not look much like kevlar either. I could of course be completely wrong and it may come out looking great- or at least interesting. But before you start covering the body with it, do a test of the decal with the overpaint first. Do it with a large enough piece (say 5cm square) that it will give you a good idea what it will look like on the body- just to see if you like it.

Also, if SMS kevlar is what you choose to cover the body with, be warned that it is difficult stuff to work with. If you're covering a body with SMS CF, you can overlap edges of the decals without seeing it. Not so at all with the kevlar decals. The kevlar is light and transparent enough that it will clearly show differences in color in what it is applied over. I haven't found a base color that matches the kevlar well enough that this hasn't been a problem (and believe me, I've tried!! Yellow, tan, brown, olive green, grey, nothing works!) I used kevlar for the inside of the oil cooler pods, and obviously theres no way to do this without overlapping edges. I had to go back and recover every square cm again just so it wouldn't show overlap. Fortunately by the time you get to two layers thick, more layers (3 or 4) doesn't look different. But unless you can cover whatever you're applying it to perfectly in one layer, you will need at least two layers everywhere to hide overlapping.

I had no fun at all doing those oil cooler pods. They're done now (and look pretty good), but the experince has seriously put me off CF decaling. It may be years before I start another project that will require CF....

I agree with MPWR on the kevlar/transparent red color reslut. I don't think it will be very attractive unless you want a "candy apple brown" F40.
Now, I do think the transparent red over silver/grey CF decal would look good as far as vsiual effect goes, maybe not on an F40 though.

Allright, so if I understand you guys correct, there is no way to put the Kevlar-decals on the body without seeing the overlaping, except using more than one layer of decal. I don´t see this happening. So...nice idea, but hard to realize...Covering the F40 with CF won´t happen, way too unrealistic...

But thanks guys. It is nice having your input on this. I need to reconsider what to do with the F40. I want to have some sort of interesting body work...

You could just leave a minimal amount of orange peel, that may look a little like kevlar. Once youve painted the base coat you could take some sand paper, and sort of criss cross across the body and then clear coat it.