Finger Nails Ink - Yeap, As Silly As It Sounds, But...

[ruben]

.....So some days ago my bifocal glasses frame broke and I went there to save some four or five hundred bucks that I would have to pay, if these two small shops located one beneath the other, would honour Jerusalem for what it really is and take their business to somewhere else.

Now, at the end of the fix, I noticed the repairman started to paint the new melted part with what it seemed to be .....finger nails paint. My mind started to tick-tack.

I leaned forwards to see the place from where the small bottle was taken, and noticed some 50 bottles besides, with different colours. I tryied to see if there is any black colored bottle, but I couldn't find any.

Black finger nails paint, what for ? Obviously you are not going to paint a camera with it, but I am tyred of repainting time and again those brassing parts in my black cameras. Some parts are metalic, other parts are plastic like, both don't catch markers ink for some respectable time.

Thus the idea of trying finger nails paint was more than worthy. Two days after I came across a small shop with much of its cheap merchandize outside, finger nails paint including.

The only issue was if our bizarre sado-maso times would not defraud and BLACK paint for finger nails is a product in demmand. Yeap!

So today I re-touched a black Kiev and a plastic unrelated cap that I use to seal the Kiev advancing knob to avoid unwanted firing.

I will have to see how long the retouching holds, but ceirtainly it seems "the thing". Furthermore, consider as well that you dilute the quite concentrated original solution. In order to obtain as flat as possible results - dilution is required.

All in all, a silly issue. Silly because it was an article so needed and so close to my nose for so long.

WARNING
In some place Brian Sweeney advices to black paint the leafs of the shutter with a marker. Never do it with nails paint as it is much thicker and its real thickness/dilution is hard to follow to close detail, in cases were high accuracy is required

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Ok, I can answer now how long it lasts. Parts that you don't touch have of course longer life. parts that you constantly touch like the end of the winding lever, will last for a day. Here the desintegration of the paint will be partial and rather small.

All in all a worth solution.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[SolaresLarrave]

Ruben, I usually take a tiny bit of nail polish to ensure that something like a soft-release button won't fall off or get unscrewed from the shutter release in my Leicas. I learned it from Tom Abrammsonn's wife, who told me in an e-mail shortly after I purchased some mini-soft release button replacements.

I'll try the same trick with a strap of mine that tends to get unhooked and puts me at risk of dropping the camera.

Thank goodness for little miracles!

 

[FallisPhoto]

Ok, I can answer now how long it lasts. Parts that you don't touch have of course longer life. parts that you constantly touch like the end of the winding lever, will last for a day. Here the desintegration of the paint will be partial and rather small.

All in all a worth solution.

Cheers,
Ruben

Ruben, fingernail paint can be anything. It can be real enamel, it can be acrylic enamel or it can even be lacquer. They all wear differently. It sounds like the one you got was acrylic enamel, which is the most common and is kind of soft.