Boss Bodies

[6666hotrod]

I have purchased a few Boss Bodies, from Smith Scale Speedway. Not the greatest, but I do like that they are fairly thick, for a clear body. I hear they can be painted on the inside, OR, the outside, which I like.
If I can get away with it, I'd MUCH rather paint, the outside !! Does anyone have any experience with these bodies ? Can use advice on trimming and painting. Also brushing it, vs spraying with spray can (inside or outside).

[mattb]

You can brush any clear body on the inside. Best to use a solid color, not a metallic. Not hard to spray them, though. I did 3 vac formed bodies today using spray can lacquer. I've repainted old bodies on the outside. That makes paint succeptable to damage but it does work. While I have had no trouble using lacquer, some guys say it won't work, so you might do a test first.

[RichD]

If you want to put a metallic color on the inside of a clear body you will have to back it up with a solid color. The solid color will affect the finished color. If, for example, when you back up a metallic red with black you will get a maroon shade. Clear bodies are usually painted on the inside using paints formulated for that purpose. If you use ordinary paint it will probably flake off in a collusion.

[REL13]

I have painted a lot of clear RC bodies, and I found It's best to use a white or silver after you use metallic paint.

[mattb]

Paint won't flake off very easy if the body is prepped good. You need to use and SOS pad to clean and sand the inside of the body. Even fine grit sandpaper, If you don't do this, the paint will flake off as Rich said. I've done metallic without a backing color, but it take a lot of coats. Better to do a couple thin coats, that does seem to hold up better. You also find that you can come up with some nice "candy" look finishes with a couple thin coats then backed by silver or gold. Later I'll add some pix of the stuff I painted today. All vac formed bodies painted on the inside with spray can lacquer.

[RichD]

If you are using a solvent based paint on a clear body and apply too much too quickly that can cause the body to curl up. It never pays to rush a paint job. It is tempting to trim clear bodies and make holes for mounting pins before you apply paint. When using solvent based paints those will attack the edges of the body and cause it to develop cracks.

[mattb]

Rich, all those bodies were painted within 10 minutes or so. I used spray can Tamiya lacquer and let the coats dry 4-5 minutes between coats.
The Auburn body was sprayed the orange first. It was two paintings about 5 minutes apart. I used the hair dryer to cure the paint between coats. I waited about an hour and peeled the tape off and sprayed the gold under the whole body. The green BRM was sprayed heavy all at one time. That is plain green. The blue Lotus was spayed in thin coats about 3 times. The tape pulled off the white sprayed about an hour later, it wasn't completely undercoated in white, just enough to cover the stripe. I have had good luck with every body I have painted with model lacquer. I've painted old Dubro, Lancer and Pactra bodies and new stuff from Dom, Patto, GeneZR1. I've never had the problems I read about on the net.

[LAMing]

I have several Boss Bodies and they're really nice for the intended purpose. I never got around to painting them (I ended up using the chassis under them to go under some hard body cars).

Having painted clear bodies from the underside in my past, I was going to go with a different approach. I simply didn't like the extreme "depth" that results from painting from the inside. The thicker the clear body, the more pronounced this effect. Hard to explain. (Looks like a car with a gazillion clear coats.)

Then, several years ago (okay, a lot of years ago) I saw a clear bodies here at HRW painted from the outside by "Turbo Kev". I then decided that was the way to go. The result looked a lot more "natural" to my eyes. Here's pics of one of "Turbo Kev's" cars as an example:





As for paint scratches:

Seeing as my interest in clear plastic would for my short track oval theme, scratches would be fine. (In fact, I modeled minor "battle damage/dents on my clear oval cars.) However, I was going to try going with gray paint on the inside of the body so any scratches would reveal gray (as if metal).

SO, there you have it. I was sipping coffee and cruising HRW, and got in a mood to prose.

All of the above strictly FWIW... which ain't much!

[mattb]

I've saved (in my opinion) a few old 60's bodies with crappy paint by painting them on the outside. Not much different than painting a hard body car. That car looks fine, very equal to the finish of most current RTR cars.

[6666hotrod]

Ming : I'll ask you about something I noticed, that I'd REALLY like to know : what's TurboKev's secret/trick to cutting those Wheelwells in the photos, so perfectly, and Cleanly ?? ...some kind of nickel-sized Punch, or something ?? Man !!

[REL13]

Tamiya has paint that's made for clear bodies. Works really good.

[6666hotrod]

Thank you All, and extra appreciation goes out to Andre Ming and MattB !! It's great to have a Community like HRW Forums, that is available to help you !!

[mattb]

A few of us are long on advice!!!

[LAMing]

6666hotrod:

I don't know what Turbo Kev did, but I've had good results using a Dremel fitted with a sanding drum. You will need to work slowly (slow speeds on the Dremel and take small amounts of material during a pass) and carefully. You'll also need to test fit the chassis often to make sure the radius is staying centered with the hub of the tire and is nice a circular. Here's a couple of examples from the many cars I've had to open with a Dremel and sanding drum...


Hard body:




Boss Body:




Good luck!

[6666hotrod]

Thank you, so much !! I've kinda' put the Dremel away, due to cutting discs constantly breaking. I just cut my brass tubing with a hacksaw, and cut sheet with metal shears. Now I have another use for the Dremel ! Again, thanks.

[LAMing]

Glad to be any help. Be sure to catch the use of a "sanding drum" part. By nature of its larger radius, it's the easiest tool to use for opening wheel wells.