Painting wheels for roller bearing and standard bearing trucks

One of my pet peeves is otherwise nicely done models riding on shiny metal wheels - it ruins the effect of all the other work done on the model.  And you should NOT use plastic wheelsets - they seem to attract dirt and grime and gum up your track.  Swap out the plastic wheels for aftermarket metal wheelsets.  

Most of my replacement wheelsets are Intermountain, available in boxes of 100 axles.  The wheel profile is not the best but they are readily available and are generally in proper gauge or easily adjusted.  I have tried other brands but they are hit and miss as far as being readily available locally.  I have found that Rapido wheelsets are always too narrow compared to the NMRA, and they are a bugger to regauge.  

My process for the wheels is fairly simple and gives good results.  Below are my go to paints:

Vallejo Air Black and Vallejo Game Effects Dry Rust

If you want to you can first clean the wheels with 99% (or whatever % you have available) alcohol to clean any oil and dirt from the wheels.  Once the wheels are clean and dry I paint the outside and inside of the wheels black along with the axle.  I use a microbrush to do this, usually doing a batch of 10-20 wheels at a time.  I employ the old theater trick of "if you don't want it to be seen, paint it black".

From right to left: unpainted, black paint and dry rust with black undercoat

Once the black paint is dry I move onto the next step.  For roller bearing wheels I apply one or more coats of the Dry Rust, depending on how rusty I want the wheels.  You should apply this paint by hand as it has a grit to it that won't be very good for an airbrush.  I really like this paint for unpainted steel and iron that has been weathered.  The black paint gives a nice undertone to the rust which dries to a nice rough texture.   You can also paint the wheel backs and axle with Dry Rust if you wish, but I don't usually bother as no one pays attention to that area of the trucks.  

You have several options for standard bearing trucks.  If the bearings are in good repair, use Dry Rust on the wheels.  If the bearings are leaky (like many seemed to be in the 1980's)  you can add additional layers.  Many wheels ended up with an oily dust and dirt encrusted face from the axle bearing grease that spattered on the wheel face.  


Years ago I found a bottle of Polly S "Fantasy Color" oily black that gives a nice grimy oily look to the wheels.  Unfortunately this has been out of production for a very long time so that paint is basically "unobtanium" these days.  It was a very bad day when I knocked the open bottle over and spilled some of this precious paint.  

I have played with a few Vallejo washes along with some Pan Pastel chalks to try and replicate the appearance.  Until I run out of my Polly S I'll use that as my go to. 

Doing these simple things can go a long way to avoiding the shiny wheel syndrome common on many layouts.  

 

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