testing, testing...

[bkrownd]

Took about 3 hours to rout the whole thing to 1/4" depth. I let it cut nice and slow. The bit was pretty dull by the second pass of the third panel. Now I have to dig out all the dust and check the consistency of depth at the joints.

3 hours - my entire block is probably cursing my name now.

[dreinecke]

Run a nail or putty knife down the slot and follow it with the shop vac. That should do the trick! Can't wait to see it.

[bkrownd]

I might go with snow theme instead of grass - batting, white felt, and pine trees.

[bkrownd]

How much prep does the MDF really need for painting? Is a wipe-down OK, or does it really need to be scuffed up? There's one panel I might scuff up more with sandpaper since it's much smoother and harder than the others. I don't have much time to do the painting.

[Ember]

MDF is VERY thirsty. It'll drink paint like an Aussie drinks beer.

[Ember]

Seeing as humidity is a problem for you, I would suggest using a 3 in one undercoat. Combined sealer/primer/undercoat. One coat of it all over, and I do mean all over. Will give you a good base for track paint on top.

[bkrownd]

I already bought some all-purpose primer and semi-gloss black. I'll probably start this evening, and may run a dehumidifier (i.e. heater) in the utility room to help the process along.

Got a suggested minimum time to let final coat (latex) dry before applying copper tape? (yeah I know, 6 months would be great...)

[jcis4me]

[bkrownd]

Hey! That scenery looks kind of familiar... ;) Thanks for the input!

They only space I have is indoors. Most of the house is fairly dry by local standards. It's built vertical, so there's a chimney effect and it catches the wind. The 3rd floor room would have been a PERFECT location if this was a bachelor pad. :violin:

I hope the latex paint is not too sticky in this climate. It will get frequenty wiped off, so the usual shelf mold shouldn't be a problem. (cats may be a problem, tho)

[bkrownd]

I think I'm going to end up with more texture in the paint than I'd like, and eventually may have to do a lot of sanding.

It's levelling a bit as it dries, but we'll see how flat it gets...

[jcis4me]

What kind of roller did you use? I used the little 1" round smooth roller and had no problems with the surface and traction. Just have to "rubber" in the surface for a couple of hours. Or use urethane tires for Paul Gage and keep surface clean.
Marty

[bkrownd]

"foam mini rollers" "best for gloss finishes"

The surface is generally flat, but a little gritty feeling, like sandpaper. I'm assuming that's the result of all those little bubbles from the foam.

[jcis4me]

I used the regular roller not the foam ones, had no problems. I think with a light sanding and using the fur type roller, you should get the finish you want, also when I rolled out the paint I rolled out the paint, I kept going over the area to spread out the paint, so to say I use very little paint on the surface. I used 1 quart of paint and had some left over! And I painted everything!
Marty

[bkrownd]

I discovered an interesting thing. The 9 MDF sheets were each a little different color and thickness. All had smooth surfaces, but the final paint texture on each MDF sheet is different, even among sheets on the same panel. The hardest, thinnest and smoothest MDF sheet (originally almost a glossy surface) has a much smoother paint surface than any of the others. Most have a somewhat rougher surface, and one is really rough like sandpaper. They were assembled into 3 panels of 3 sheets and painted at the same time, and in fact the roughest and smoothest sheets are next to each other on the same panel. But all of them were smooth and dusted clean before painting, and I didn't notice such a difference in the primer surface.

So, choose your MDF very carefully. Maybe some kind of sealer would have helped?

[bkrownd]

I taped the easiest panel. The tape went down great with the standard tape tool - it's very nice that the tape tool is made of plastic, which worked smoothly. However the tape did migrate a little in some corners during the first few minutes, and despite "burnishing" the tape the edges of some sections did come up a bit overnight.

I may try wire nails here and there to reduce the risk of any large sections of tape from coming loose in a catastrophic fashion while I'm not around. edit: I found some copper plated wire-nails to use

So, I started wondering how long I will have to avoid getting INOX on the copper tape for fear of it inhibiting re-adhesion of edges that peel up now and then before it settles down?

I ran a Fly Giulia around the first panel a few times to get a feel for it, and didn't have any big problem with a Carrera GTO that has about the largest guide in my collection.

To keep the panels flush and level when the track is put together I'm going to use thick tie plates and 1/4-20 bolts. The bolts will be in counterbored holes on the top side, with a tie plate on the back side on either side of the slot. There holes on the tie plates are large enough to allow the adjustment to get the panels flush at the edge. I may cement the bolts into the counterbored holes.