brush painting: technique, history, practical today?

[Reid Welch]

Before 1924 almost all fine finishes were multi-coat varnish jobs, hand brushed, perfectly glossy,
with a depth of color and a shine unrivaled by today's best work. The finishes were not generally weather-durable as today,
but, oh! What a look when new.

Automobiles were finished over a period of many weeks. There were no brush marks nor orange peel.

The most basic finish, and almost universally used for bike frames, was "japan": a baked-on jet black varnish,
blacker and more glossy than any paint available today.

The Model T was finished in japan; its all-metal parts, flow-coated and baked and re-coated.
The finish was tough, hard, yet, weathered dull outside after a few months, due to the fact that the basic material
is a form of asphalt: gilsonite, the most ancient of all alphaltums. UV light breaks down the gloss in short order;
indoors, hanging from the ceiling of the garage, is a new-old-stock Model T fender. It is as glossy and black as new,
though the finish is nearing one hundred years old.

Here's a small demo video. This is the blackest paint in the world because its color is not from particles of pigment,
but from the molecular-sized motes of ancient carbon in gilsonite. I made this color varnish (for that is what it is)
from the raw materials. The varnish is over ten years old and never goes bad in the bottle, if kept from oxygen.

Brush painting today is not so easy: paints like Rustoleum no longer are linseed oil based,
and so, they cannot flow-out, erasing their brush marks like japan will do.

Yet, if someday I repaint my bike, I =think= I may brush paint the frame.
Why? Because it will look good enough and it won't be much work,
and if the bike falls over and gets scraped, it can be touched up.
Why make a working bike look like a million bucks? Besides, yellow (the color I'd choose)
hardly shows brush marks, particularly on round tubing and small surface areas; it's not like painting an entire car door or panel.

First demonstration in eighty years of application of japan black:
[youtube]6WAI0sC4tJc[/youtube]
"HQ" whenever possible, please?

---

discuss? disgusted? doubtful? Rustoleum is an alkyd enamel, not tough, not so durable nor glossy as acrylic enamel
or single or two-stage polyurethanes. It's not so great for brushing because it has almost no oil in its forumula;
drying oil (linseed oil) was what made the old-time oil paints lay out so nicely as to look like wet glass.

See antique films of old cars in their prime: they look wonderful, better than paint jobs of today; more depth, more gloss,
at least for a few months of service.

______________________
________________________

Coach painted (varnished) automobile:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0SvK4_loL4

________________

Free Books for download demonstrating the techniques of hand painting *varnishing, really*, fine work.

 

[dogman dan]

Sure its practical today. Use a bit of paint thinner to get the new paints to lay out quick, and then do multiple coats instead of one thick one. Quality brushes help, but I can do pretty nice jobs with cheap throwaways that look like a barbeque sauce brush. It's all in getting the consistency just right for the weather of the day. I have a couple hundred wrought iorn gates and window bars that I maintain at the condo's where I work. Too much trouble to mask on some of em, so we brush em, and get decent results. Any mistakes can be sanded out, and fixed on the next coat.


Another approach would be to use a catylized enamel auto paint, which can also be thinned to get it just right, and multiple coated. A clear last coat will get you the shine. Expensive stuff, meant to be sprayed, but with some practice on a metal trash can, good results can be had with a brush.

 

[Reid Welch]

All artist supply stores sell a kind of Chinese brush, ancient in its design. I think its hair is sheep hair, super soft and compliant.

It's called a "Hake" brush. Maybe Japanese? A one inch wide hake brush makes beautiful brushing results;
it's seen in the video demonstration. So there is an option. The new brush must be broken in, freed from loose hairs.
I use a brush on the brush and compressed air, and the hake brush sheds very few hairs. It lasts and lasts and is cheap.

So there's an option. Regular paint brushes: for me they are all too stiff and coarse to get nice results for finer work.

hth, and thank you, Jules, for helpful input.

We cannot thin alkyd enamel too very much because the gloss will suffer, as the binder, diluted, loses its body.
Alkyd enamels came in around 1930 and quickly supplanted linseed oil paints
because alkyds dry so much faster and harder.
But alkyds, lacking the internal-slip of a true oil, don't lay out nearly so sweetly as linseed oil paint or linseed oil varnish;
can't hardly get coach paints any more. There is a UK maker, at least there was ten years ago
but they don't export to the USA last time I checked. They advocate brush painting your own car
instead of messy spray painting.
This is not sales talk, but reality: spray booths and climate control are beyond most of us.

A clear coat is grand, but makes touch ups obvious.
This bike is going to get used hard, so I don't want to invest great time in tearing it all down at all,
nor making an impressive looking paint job that begs "steal me".

===

edits: little corrections of line breaks and wordings.
r.

 

[dogman dan]

yes, overthinning will cause problems with the gloss, but you can get away with a lot more on the coats that are not the top finish coat, and it beats having too thick paint dry too fast and leave a bunch of brush marks. The thinning may affect durability too, I really don't know, But I get better results on wrought iorn burglar bars than straight from the can. The thinning is less than you'd use to get it to work in a sprayer anyway. There are real nice products to put a bit more gloss on paint finishes. I used to use mirror glaze on my flamed volkswagon bug. That had a catalyzed enamel finish that was rubbed out with compound like a laquer coach finish would be. For the reasons you state, I didn't want a clear coat, clear doesn't last well in New Mexico, so I used mirror glaze to shine it up. Applied like a wax, it would last about 6 months and look like a clear coat. A touchup could be done with a brush, rubbed out, and then never show even in the strongest light.

 

[Reid Welch]

I'm currently reading up on paints again. I have books going back a hundred years.
I've spray painted with the latest, ultra superior paints and gotten impeccable, not-repairable results.

A bike is going to be used hard.

Alkyd enamel is not to be clear coated.
It will not resist bug stains or insect (bee droppings) left to dry.

I recall the bad old days: alkyd enamels were the factory paints used from the 1940s through the 1960s.
You had a car paint job that, once well-aged (it takes months for alkyd to fully harden), could be rubbed, polished, etc, for years.

You put your car in the paint shop and got back a nice-looking job, very soft paint.
"Do not wax the car for six months. Do not let insect dropping remain on the paint even for a day;
you'll have an etch mark.

Alkyds are about obsolete and good riddance. However, they are the cheapest and most-brushable
of the hardware store paints. Do not thin with acetone, no matter that this is what Rustoleum recommends today:
if the humidity is at all high, your paint will not flow out and will frost with water condensation.
Use a -bit- of mineral spirits or xylol, or, best, for small parts like bike tubing: straight from the can.

Use a super-soft brush as mentioned above.

Slow-low bake the alkyd in the oven or in the hot summer sun to speed the cure, from months, to mere hours.

Wet sand the first coat if needed to fix flaws; use no coarser than 400 grit.
Make very sure NO oil or dirt or grease remains on the bike parts to contaminate the brushed paint.

The bike gets crashed? Well, just wet sand and apply two coats, giving the first coat plenty of time to fully cure (bake).
But do not ever, ever bake an alkyd until the next day, and do not heat it more than 200F; 150F is safer.
WHEN all paint odor is absent, and WHEN it is hard enough to not dent under the fingernail,
wet sand and recoat.
Don't even think to polish the paint if at all possible.

A light colored alkyd will show no marks or defects, relatively speaking (we are brushing, not spraying).
-----
I know custom bike builders here in Miami who make frames from scratch, with the world's finest tubing, lugs and brazing work beyond compare. Then they send the frame to their bike frame paint specialist.
He paints in a proper spray paint booth, any pearl or metallic, clear coated, urethane, eternal paint:
just the sort of frame, so beautiful that it begs to be never ridden for fear of marring the tough paint in a spill,
or that some jerk will steal the perfect looking bike.

Sometimes CHEAP and "good enough" is more desirable for a WORKING bike than real pro stuff.

Old time varnishes and oil paints laid out like glass, exceeding in beauty any paint system of today.
But they were even softer than alkyds.

One of the great advantages of alkyd: it does not chip: it is rock and pebble-proof, compared against any of the single or two-stage enamels; alkyd adheres better than any paint other than oil based varnish.

Life? There are violins today in regular use that were varnished four hundred years ago.
Despite wear-off at the edges, the old varnishes are hard, sound and make the instrument sing.

I just want a yellow bike. I do not want to strip it all to bits, and make a spray booth.
Besides, now it is summer in Miami: too hot and humid to make a first-class spray job
without careful climate control.

With the hake brush and five dollar can of yellow, cheapo-rustoleum, just like 1935,
I can paint in the sunlight, not worry about dust motes, fisheyes, flaking-off, nor rust.

POLISHES, almost every wax and polish today contains silicones: the painter's worst enemy.
Prep of previously waxed, old paints of any sort, is the most important step in obtaining an acceptable paint job.

IF there is any tendency to fish-eye, STOP. If spraying, mist coat only, until the frame is covered.
Hope you have really de-greased and dulled all the paint, or when you wet-coat it: the fish eyes appear again,
and you have to re-do the whole damn job.

With brushed enamel, if a fish eye appears, STOP, wipe off your abortive effort with mineral spirits,
sand, degrease (Westley's Bleche-White) is a great cleaner: it is basically lye.
Use gloves, non chlorine scouring powder, Dawn dish detergent, etc.
GET THE SURFACE SMOOTH with wet paper, no coarser than 400 grit,
and get it super-clean, that the rinse water shows no tendency to bead up at all.

None of this is a worry with a new, cheap bike like mine: it has never been near silicones.
I keep silicones away from my bike, like I keep bananas out of the refrigerator.

The new fork arrives tomorrow. Then I prep it, and I paint it and it will be alkyd, and hard-cured
as alkyd can be (but not as tough as the acrylic factory paint) in two days or less.

Then we ride, and, at convenience, prep and brush paint the remainder of the assembled cruiser,
removing only the plastic fenders and headset nuts, crankset, etc.
And bake it in the sun, and at the end of the day (it is hot and sunny here now),
rinse the bike with clear water and mild soap to remove any bee or insect droppings,
which WILL etch fresh alkyd enamel in mere hours.

100 buck per gallon urethanes and other newer paints are so much better.
Some might even be brushable, but not likely: they flash-dry too fast because they are dissolved
in fast-evaporating solvents, and thinned for spray work.

Otherwise, spray acrylic enamel, the auto enamel of the 70s and 80s (Duplicolor) are superb
for spray painting small parts: rather fast to dry to the touch, and will cure hard in days instead of weeks.

LOW TEMP baking speeds the cure of all paints, oil or otherwise.
Alkyds die at 250F. Some urethanes handle higher temps. Powdercoat (oh gee, great stuff),
is baked-on at 400F. Have fun retouching a damaged powdercoated frame.

Reports later in the cruiser build thread at "show your ebike errors" panel

HTH,

blowhanz reid

 

[Reid Welch]

yes, overthinning will cause problems with the gloss, but you can get away with a lot more on the coats that are not the top finish coat, and it beats having too thick paint dry too fast and leave a bunch of brush marks. The thinning may affect durability too, I really don't know,

Pardon me for abridging your good posting. The old painters knew from great, miserable re-do jobs, that thinning the paint or varnish, as supplied by the maker, would likely cause a host of trouble: no gloss, no durability. Thinning the old paints, at least, guaranteed a "drop out" of the solids and a dis-association of the binder (resin) from the pigment. Thinning was acceptable ONLY for the very first coats of "japan color", which was the base of all coach painting jobs: japan color mixed by hand with a bit of turps and a touch of linseed oil, then rubbed smooth. Then the onerous job of building thickness with quick-drying "rubbing varnishes". And for the best work, the final coat was called "flowing varnish"; a "long oil" (high linseed content) varnish which dried ever so slowly, but left no brush marks or orange peel at all.
Some painters swore by 'aging' the flow coat with spray-downs with cold tap water only, after several days of drying.

Modern paints (and I mean 1930 alkyds; they have not changed, really) cannot tolerate much thinning at all; any thinning also reduces their gloss. The secret: brush small parts quickly and with unthinned paint and use a hake brush only (I swear curse words against 20 dollar "premium" paint brushes: guaranteed to put deep brush marks in alkyd paints.

So, work fast, work deftly, don't try to brush paint the large door or hood panel of a car with alkyd, unthinned; spray instead?
But for bike tubing: it should be a piece of cake to get a fine looking job, particularly with yellow:
yellow is about the most forgiving of all colors. Yellow, cream, white, light colors.

Have a NOS can of 1910 automobile "color varnish": a rubbing varnish bearing a bit of cream colored pigment.
I opened the can briefly and painted a glass panel. The century old varnish laid out fine and dried well.
I capped the can instantly and put it back on the shelf. Try that with any alkyd paint? In a month or less there will be a rubbery skin of useless, semi-dry paint on the top of the can's contents. Not so with antique varnishes, which, if sealed in their cans, will remain good for a century, for sure.

In the 1870s, commercial varnish making really took off as an industry.
The makers closely held their formula secrets, but basically it was COOK (crack) the resin in huge copper cauldrons,
then cool below the flashpoint of turps, add turps, blend, and put the thousands of gallons into gigantic, two story-high wooden casks and =let the varnish age and let it settle (self filter) for up to a year.
Decant from the aging casks, can, and sell to the coach painter with the admonishment: "don't you dare thin this varnish with even a drop of turps or you will cause the varnish to do all sorts of bad things, such as "seed" (speck), caused by resin drop-out.

It is fascinating to watch paint dry. It's more fascinating to know how the old paints were managed, made,by fire, time, rule of thumb, intuition, practical experience, and applied in conditions that ranged from cold to hot.

The old time coach painter's life was hard, dangerous (because of the lead putty they had to sand and the "rough stuff" lead-varnish filler. "Plumbago" poisoning ended most painters' careers before age fifty.
You, if wise, wore a wet handkerchief over you face when dry sanding, and you washed your hands often, for even cleaning the brushes and handling the leaded paints, would eventually put enough lead in your system to cause Bright's disease, for which there was no cure. At best, you suffered all sorts of vague illness from lead poisoning, blue fingertips, malaise, nausea and tremors.

The old days were bad days for painters. And the flies...and then the proud, perfectly painted carriage
was probably stored in the animal barn, against all sage advice: in one season, the ammonia fumes from animal wastes would destroy a linseed oil paint job.

Likewise, if your car or carriage was run in the wet, you or your man WASHED the car instantly upon arrival back at home: hours of work to do that job rightly, using pure vegetable soap for the purpose,
no alkali allowed in the soap.

So there we have the basics. And you today who brush: if you get results you like, you are doing well by doing good.

Intuition, attention and patience remain the modern painters' prime ally.


________________________
sole edit: you may have noted, or note from my other twgweeky posts, that I often open "(" a line,
but forget to close the paragraph! This is because I write on the fly. I need an editor.
A housefly will do because they leave specks too.

:|


______
an "edit" but no edit was made; I only wanted to "grab" this exact url, done by "see your posting submission", so to speak. For PC members only, as an example of technical prose in my own style.

 

[Grinhill]

I have used products from POR-15 in doing car restoration. This is a single-pack paint which supposedly absorbs moisture as it dries (water-cure?). It has a self-levelling effect which eliminates brush strokes, gives a great spray-like finish from a brush. (no affiliation with product).

 

[Reid Welch]

I have used products from POR-15 in doing car restoration. This is a single-pack paint which supposedly absorbs moisture as it dries (water-cure?). It has a self-levelling effect which eliminates brush strokes, gives a great spray-like finish from a brush. (no affiliation with product).

I have used POR-15, tried it on the old Model T restoration. Good: It moisture-cures, it dries harder than granite in one day. It is absolutely eternal. It FLOWS ON LIKE GLASS, liquid.

Bad: No paint in the world can overcoat it and stick, not unless you rough-sand the POR.
I used "black".
Like all "black" paints of today, but worse, it was not a true black: in sunshine it was an ashy, gray black.
It was slick, shiny, and not Ford black. It was then that I gave up on modern paints. I would become the only living human being to create from scratch, and apply by dip or spray or brush, the original Model T paint: japan, made from fifty million year old fossilized asphalt.

Black paint, it is known by all painters, is the hardest colour to touch-up match: they all have casts of gray or brown, and are "black" ony in dim light. Out of doors, in direct comparison with Ford black: they are anything but not true black. And so...old things sometimes offer unique advantages: I could brush-touch-up my chassis at any time, from now to one thousand years from today, and the touch-up would match. Not so with ANY other black paint in the world.

I am my own thinker. I make mistakes. The ten year old japan spills on the concrete of this garage floor
will not come off, at all. I remember my beloved, crashed T, by looking down and weeping, figuratively.

OIL TOPICS.

HERE is a tribute by some youtube member. It is almost certainly by a youth I know from the toy steam forum.
I do not know, nor care to know which lad made and sings this song.
There was never a more moving tribute, nor greater promise of life, oil, goodness and philosophy,
than you are about to experience. Please watch this---go to a friend's home if you have no broadband.
Cry, but with joy, knowing that the past renews itself every day. Fred Dibnah...forever alive in the new lives he inspired:
[youtube]jguQI8IVfWU[/youtube]


Not one word in the USA press, ever. But in the North of England, in particular....
[youtube]hmNEC78ttS0[/youtube]

You just watch him at work, young then older, and always the same: the most calm, competent, reliable, brave, modest, cheerful of men ever made by nature.


++++++++++++++++++
He took down
So many stacks
Always with such deep respect,
And as if atonement for the deed,
He perched the church, a steeplejack
And patched the leaks
And fixed the face
Of time, with his
immortal Grace
++++++++++++++++++

once-over verse, for this spot only, no edits, no adjustments needed.

EDIT ADDENDUM. See the author-singer's responce below.
A Lancashire man, modest and REAL as they ALL are.
Read it and weep or smile. Smile!.

 

[Reid Welch]

Ans: because two forums tolerate one very eccentric character.

I am am happy. The new front fork is ready to pick up.

All is well. I have no life, but I have real friends. Real friends, around the world.

http://modelsteam.myfreeforum.org/about19388.html

8)

 

[John in CR]

The only consumer spray paint that I've found to be durable for my bikes is the epoxy spray paint meant for appliances. It's severely color limited, takes a day to dry with about a week to fully cure, but worth the effort for an easy method.

John

 

[alanfromdarwen]

I have used products from POR-15 in doing car restoration. This is a single-pack paint which supposedly absorbs moisture as it dries (water-cure?). It has a self-levelling effect which eliminates brush strokes, gives a great spray-like finish from a brush. (no affiliation with product).

I have used POR-15, tried it on the old Model T restoration. Good: It moisture-cures, it dries harder than granite in one day. It is absolutely eternal. It FLOWS ON LIKE GLASS, liquid.

Bad: No paint in the world can overcoat it and stick, not unless you rough-sand the POR.
I used "black".
Like all "black" paints of today, but worse, it was not a true black: in sunshine it was an ashy, gray black.
It was slick, shiny, and not Ford black. It was then that I gave up on modern paints. I would become the only living human being to create from scratch, and apply by dip or spray or brush, the original Model T paint: japan, made from fifty million year old fossilized asphalt.

Black paint, it is known by all painters, is the hardest colour to touch-up match: they all have casts of gray or brown, and are "black" ony in dim light. Out of doors, in direct comparison with Ford black: they are anything but not true black. And so...old things sometimes offer unique advantages: I could brush-touch-up my chassis at any time, from now to one thousand years from today, and the touch-up would match. Not so with ANY other black paint in the world.

I am my own thinker. I make mistakes. The ten year old japan spills on the concrete of this garage floor
will not come off, at all. I remember my beloved, crashed T, by looking down and weeping, figuratively.

OIL TOPICS.

HERE is a tribute by some youtube member. It is almost certainly by a youth I know from the toy steam forum.
I do not know, nor care to know which lad made and sings this song.
There was never a more moving tribute, nor greater promise of life, oil, goodness and philosophy,
than you are about to experience. Please watch this---go to a friend's home if you have no broadband.
Cry, but with joy, knowing that the past renews itself every day. Fred Dibnah...forever alive in the new lives he inspired:
[youtube]jguQI8IVfWU[/youtube]


.[/i][/color]

hi there, i am really glad you like my song about fred dibnah, "fred dibnah,missing you" thought i would join this forumn just to say hello, my stats on youtube show me where it is being linked to thats how i knew to come here, and no i am not on that steam engine forumn.. well not at the moment but i may drop in soon.. my name is alan walton, i live in darwen lancashire, england.. i was born in bolton, and being from bolton i have always been a big fan of fred, infact has it says in the video he is my local hero... i have visited his grave now and then, his house will soon be open to the public (once they get planning consent) and i will be the first in line to see inside.. its a lovely house.. alan walton(alanfromdarwen)

PS... forgot to say.. this song is now on fred dibnahs website too, and i am so pleased about it, see it here
http://www.freddibnah.co.uk/music "and pass it on to your friends, help me get more viewing...." thanks again.. alan.

 

[Reid Welch]

http://www.poetrycritical.net/forum/read/192079/

 

[Reid Welch]

[youtube]hvRjzGqgYtA[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvRjzGqgYtA

SEE THE QUOTE AND REPLY TWO ABOVE


This is for a young man named Alan
I am going to cross-thread-post this exact posting here.
So sheeping what! It's important. Alan and YOU ALL are vital to our lives;
to my own, insignificant, silly little sojourn here among the living.


---



He knows exactly the man, and the means and ways. And keens
his knife of life on oiled hyde, slick and sharp, and such an eye;
ne're a slip nor error, but blood transfused, infused.
And flowers, red, can't cry.

---

 

[alanfromdarwen]

He took down
So many stacks
Always with such deep respect,
And as if atonement for the deed,
He perched the church, a steeplejack
And patched the leaks
And fixed the face
Of time, with his
Immortal Grace
see bellow

 

[alanfromdarwen]

[youtube]hvRjzGqgYtA[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvRjzGqgYtA

SEE THE QUOTE AND REPLY TWO ABOVE


This is for a young man named Alan
I am going to cross-thread-post this exact posting here.
So sheeping what! It's important. Alan and YOU ALL are vital to our lives;
to my own, insignificant, silly little sojourn here among the living.


---



He knows exactly the man, and the means and ways. And keens
his knife of life on oiled hyde, slick and sharp, and such an eye;
ne're a slip nor error, but blood transfused, infused.
And flowers, red, can't cry.

---

i think i know what you are saying,check it out and get back to me... very sneaky, and it does help to prove i am who i say i am.. alan.

 

[Lock]

*BUMP*
This is the only thread on ES that mentions POR-15 so thought I would add this here... just came across the EVDL:

[EVDL] NEW POR-15 DISCOUNT
Monday, January 11, 2010 2:45 PM
From: "phil galati" <ph ilgalat i2004@ ver izon. net>
To: e v@li sts.sj su.ed u
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When calling in to POR-15 800-457-6715 or ordering on line WWW.por15.Com
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Phil Galati
Trans Atlantic Electric Conversions