Wheelset holders for mass painting/weathering

[CNR5529]

I've been meaning to share this for a while, in case anyone can use this tool to speed up their own work. A little while back I decided that I hate brush painting and weathering wheelsets one wheel at a time. I like to work in batches, particularly when it comes to weathering, and this task just slowed me right down. There is/was a wheelset holder available at some point to help with this, but if I remember correctly it could hold only 1 car's worth of wheels at a time for airbrushing. Although this is a bit of an improvement, its still not exactly "batch worthy" considering I have hundreds of cars to weather. So I decided to improve upon the idea, scale up the capacity, and make a holder that can accommodate multiple cars' worth of wheels at a time.

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After a bit of testing with various designs, I settled on using this linear individually clamped arrangement, printing them out in Shapeways "White, Strong and Flexible" (now Natural Versatile) material. It is flexible enough to clamp the wheelsets in place, protect the wheel tread surface during painting, and allow for airbrusing on the wheel faces, wheel backs and axles quickly and efficiently. Best of all, I could print out multiple holders for various wheel sizes and really speed up the production. So far, most wheelset brands I have tested seem to fit without issue, with the exception of a few Bachmann wheels which are slightly oversized. I've tested Micro Trains, Fox Valley, Intermountain, Athearn, Rapido, and a few others successfully.

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I now use 4 holders for 33" wheels, and 4 holders for 36" wheels, allowing me to paint 96 wheels (24 cars worth) of each size at a time. By the time I finish painting the fourth set, the first is ready for a second coat (using acrylic paint). In an evening I can usually get through at least 300 wheelsets - its usually longer to remove the wheelsets and load the holders than actually do the painting. Now that is the sort of production I was after! On and off over a few weeks, I estimate to have painted well over 1500 wheelsets (stopped counting after the first thousand  ). At this point when I get packs of lo-pro wheels, I just run them all through the pain shop and have painted wheels ready to go as needed.

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I found that the little bit of paint on the axle cone easily comes off when the wheelset is put in a truck and rolled back and forth a few times (or just use your finger nail to scrape it off...)

Anyways, if anyone else is interested in speeding up their wheel painting, I have released these on Shapeways in single and 2 packs, for both 33" and 36" wheelsets. Happy weathering!

33" wheelsets:
https://www.shapeways.com/product/F3U9YYWNL/n-scale-wheel-holder-33-quot

https://www.shapeways.com/product/27BZK3B7R/n-scale-wheel-holder-33-quot-2-pack?optionId=202012887&li=shops

36" wheelsets:
https://www.shapeways.com/product/KEGD36GWV/n-scale-wheel-holder-36-quot?optionId=202019667&li=shops

https://www.shapeways.com/product/DRJ2ERXEY/n-scale-wheel-holder-36-quot-2-pack?optionId=202010964&li=shops

[muktown128]

Awesome idea.  Thanks for sharing!

[Lemosteam]

Cool.  Does this work on metal axles as well?  Also what brand and color do you recommend for plastic and or metal wheelsets?

[CNR5529]

Cool.  Does this work on metal axles as well?  Also what brand and color do you recommend for plastic and or metal wheelsets?

Yup, I have painted plastic wheels by MT, Atlas, Athearn, IM, etc. and metal wheels by FMV, IM, Rapido, (some) Bachmann, and a few more I'm sure. Basically, if the wheel is actually produced to 33 or 36 scale inches, it will fit in this holder. I came across some Bmann wheels that were slightly oversized, so for those I just brush painted, but you can easily ream the holes wider on a holder if you had many oversized wheels to paint.

All were painted using Vallejo paints with no primer, mixed up per @tom mann's weathering book. I model the transition era, so most of my wheels are an oily green/black. But I did a few modern cars with rusty paint too. As I further weather individual cars, I go back and apply other colours as needed to represent various spills, or whatever. As for the actual colour of the wheelsets I buy, I found it doesnt really matter as the shiny tread surface of plastic or metal wheels contrasts with the painted matte wheel faces to great effect. (That and I dont want to start another plastic vs metal wheel debate   )

Also, I put together a Vallejo paint colour cross reference a while back, which may be helpful as many of the paints called out in the weathering book are out of production now... https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=46475.msg607563#msg607563

Hope this helps!

[craigolio1]

Gimme gimme gimme gimme. Sooooo many wheel sets to paint.

Craig.

[Rivet Miscounter]

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From the looks of your finger, you might need to make the popsicle stick portion a little longer.   

Seriously though, that is really cool.  Would you consider make one available for Z-scale?  I could send you sample wheels.

[ednadolski]

Whata bout the 'shadow' side of the axles?   I guess they all have to be rotated and re-sprayed?


MAybe the wheelset centers could be offset, and use round posts instead of the solid, full-lenght separator?

[CNR5529]

From the looks of your finger, you might need to make the popsicle stick portion a little longer.   

Seriously though, that is really cool.  Would you consider make one available for Z-scale?  I could send you sample wheels.

Yeah... I was excited to try these out... usually I put on gloves to paint. 

As for the z version, certainly! No need to ship wheelsets, all I need is confirmation on the wheel diameter at the root of the tread/flange, and the distance between flange faces (distance between clamping faces). PM me offline if you want to chat a bit further about it. I can even make the popsicle stick bigger for you...

Whata bout the 'shadow' side of the axles?   I guess they all have to be rotated and re-sprayed?

MAybe the wheelset centers could be offset, and use round posts instead of the solid, full-lenght separator?

I did try a version similar to this, but in practice I found it to be a bit too flimsy. There is probably a happy medium where there is a bit more gap to allow spraying the hidden side of axles without compromising the strength of the wheel holder. That said, I have found that this method does allow for some overspray to cover most of the axle and back of wheel to some extent (depending how many different angles you spray from of course). In the mean time, as it takes at least 2 coats to get the wheel faces covered, its not too hard to use a pair of pliers to rotate the axles a bit to get better coverage on the axles.

That said, you did give me a new idea on how to do this a bit better... When I get a minute I'll cad something up.

[Mark5]

Like 

[Ed Kapuscinski]

There's been an HO version of this for ages that I've been covetous of.

Thank you for designing it!

[daniel_leavitt2000]

I need to get a few of these. Any chance of doing one for engine wheelsets as well?

[CNR5529]

I need to get a few of these. Any chance of doing one for engine wheelsets as well?

Steam or diesel? Either way, why not? 

Just need wheel diameter and flange clearance/distance for specific wheelsets. For locomotives we will want to mask the axles so as not to paint any gears and such... I suppose we can do that with tape, or a printed guard of some sort.

[randgust]

I imagine the paint rubs off the axle points under use - doesn't  it?   It should easily for acrylics.

[davefoxx]

I imagine the paint rubs off the axle points under use - doesn't  it?   It should easily for acrylics.

I would think that you don't want paint in there, which could gum it up a little, but @CNR5529 said you could easily scrape it off with a finger nail.  Orrrrrrrrrrr, it's a solution against the slinky effect. 

DFF

[ednadolski]

it's a solution against the slinky effect. 

not really.... just changes the exact point at which the slinky occurs.   I can deminstrate MT-equipped cars doing the slinky even when all of them are equipped with drag springs.

Ed