Painting Carrera Track

[greenjo2]

I painted a couple dozen pieces of Carrera track gray several months ago and everything went fine with the painting and it has held up well to racing. I decided to try and paint some more track and borders this time.

I'm having trouble with frequent 'Orange Peel' on the border pieces. I'm using Rust-Oleum spray paint, one coat of Flat Gray primer then coats of Perfect Gray. As I said the process works great on track pieces but not great on borders. Is there something that should be done to borders before painting them?

Thanks

John

[dw5555]

Hey John, are you cleaning the pieces with anything before you paint? 95% of my track is rolled but I do have a few pieces that I have replaced and sprayed. Some with Rustoleum primer and others with Duplicolor primer. I just used the primer without a topcoat. The different colored pieces in the 1st pic is the different spray primers I was using. The overall painted track has been down 7 yrs now without any issues. Behr enamel primer.
Dave

[b.yingling]

I have pretty much *only* my borders painted. I used a quart of cheap gray paint I bought at Wal-Mart and a pack of cheap foam brushes. I didn't do anything to the borders, just applied paint. I've been using some of them for 10+ years now with no issues.

[chrisguyw]

Hi John, Orange peel is generally a sign of too little paint applied, or applied from too great a distance, giving the paint droplets a bit of time to dry before contacting the surface.

To be honest, most of the Carrera tracks I have helped paint, seen painted, or have seen on the Forums have been done with flat latex paint done with a brush or roller....no issues on any of them (likely talking 50+ tracks)......the latex covers very well, is very durable, provides great grip, can be mixed in any gray/black you want and, is very inexpensive.

Cheers
Chris Walker

[greenjo2]

Thank you for the replies. I guess I'm going to roll all the borders.

[greenjo2]

The most recent layout I was using, until I started painting again.

[dw5555]

Holy Crap John it's Digital. Will wonders ever cease. Randy do you remember John from our Mike days?

[32lbking]

Yeah of course I remember John. I was going to comment on that yesterday, but got distracted before I could. Good looking track, John. I don't think anyone else that raced there at the time we did got into digital.

[dw5555]

If you remember right Digital was taboo. Probably still is...

[greenjo2]

I've got a TekSlots Switch Box so I'm running both ways. I couldn't afford to chip the entire fleet even if I had the time.

[dw5555]

Tekslots was a good move. I built my own back when we were running at Mikes.

[Fathead59]

Why would you have to chip the entire fleet , just have enough chips for the amount of cars you can run at one time . Then let each drive pick a car to run that race . I have the Scaletrix digital and that is what I plan on doing .

[Fathead59]

And that should have been "driver" not drive

[dw5555]

He doesn't chip, that's why he uses TekSlots. Allows the use of any analog car to run on digital track.
Dave

[Fathead59]

I didn't realize that you could do that

[Fathead59]

Does that only work with Carrera , or could it work with Scaletrix

[SlotCat]

TekSlots switchable CU track section only works with Carrera track. Here's some links, I'm not affiliated with Tekslot in any way.

https://www.carreraslots.com/slot-car/TS34486.html

https://www.slotcarspacesolutions.com/products/tek-slots-dual-mode-carrera-digital-analog-control-unit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3_z0xptzQ4

[greenjo2]

Working on the pit lane at the moment. Still trying to decide which signs to put up along pit row. I'm also thinking of making it a section or two longer.

[dw5555]

Look at you go with all the different colors. If you can afford the space I would make the pit a track longer and move your fuel sensor a straight further up into the pit. The reason behind it is so if a car comes in too fast and does a little fishtailing it doesn't miss the sensor. The 1 track cushion before the sensor allows the car to straighten out.
Dave

[greenjo2]

Dave, my plan was to order two more single straights and put one in before the fuel sensor and one right before the pit exit. I'm also swapping out two of the regular straights and replacing them with a lane change 'left' prior to pit exit.

[dw5555]

Flathead, TekSlots works for any analog car. It just doesn't allow any of the digital accessories to work.

[Fathead59]

Thanks , when I first saw that Scaletrix had digital I didn't realize that you could do it with other systems . That was why I made the comment about the chips . I would say that 2/3 of the cars I have are Scaletrix for that reason . My thought was when we race you grab a controller and a chip , pick a car , and off to the races we go . Like I said , right or wrong that was how I was going to do it

[Fathead59]

Also , I am not knocking anyones preferred style of racing . It is only a hobby after all

[greenjo2]

Here's a partially completed 3/30 High Banked Turn with inner and outer borders painted.

[dinglebery]

That's interesting...