Painted FED 3a

Both look really good to me. I always like the Olive. Now you can toss 'em back in the Bay as "Very Rare Military yadda-yadda" and triple your money. [joke] Did you retain the original cover on both? Well done. Inspiring indeed.
 
w3rk5 said:
Wow! Thank you eveyone for the comments. .....I'm gonna be working on a more detailed set of instructions soon. I hope to have it up by this weekend.
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P L E A S E.

Cheers,
Ruben
 
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I am digging that olive drab. I think I may go with a flat or semi-semi-gloss finish on the next paint job. Maybe panzer gray;)
 
Did you bake the parts in a warm oven after you applied the paint? I've heard that this makes the paint harder.

Robin
 
TVphotog.........panzer gray would look cool. Flat black would look kinda neat also. Whatever you decide on painting it by all means post it up here. I'd love to see the finished results.

Robin......I don't recommend you baking any paint unless the manufacturer says so. I think people who bake the paint just want it to cure faster. I personally would perfer to let paint cure naturally.
 
An oven gets much to hot, even at the lowest setting for paint. Not to mention what will happen if the paint melts and drips into your oven... I use an old food dehydrator to 'dry' my paint. With flat paint it really doesn't matter. When using a gloss paint it helps quite a bit. The warm enviroment helps the paint flow out better resulting in a higher gloss with less orange peel. I leave it in the dehydrator at least overnight (for enamels) to sometime even weeks(for Laquers). The dehydrator will only get to about 150 degrees and by using the slots on the top you can reduce that down to around 100 degrees. Once I have decided that the finished piece has cured enough I unplug the dehydrator and allow the piece to cool to room temperature before removing it. The soft paint is very easy to mar with fingerprints. By allowing it to cool you will not have to worry about leaving fingerprints in your brand new paint job.


Oh, hey, I forgot to ask. Did you mask the shutter speed dial or did you remove it before painting. I haven't had the best results with masking. I have been looking at how to remove and re-install the shutter speed dial but I haven't had much luck. On all my Fed 3s it seems that the shutter speed dial is a press fit and should be easy to remove... I haven't been able to budge one yet though
 
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TVphotog said:
Oh, hey, I forgot to ask. Did you mask the shutter speed dial or did you remove it before painting. I haven't had the best results with masking. I have been looking at how to remove and re-install the shutter speed dial but I haven't had much luck. On all my Fed 3s it seems that the shutter speed dial is a press fit and should be easy to remove... I haven't been able to budge one yet though
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I masked the shutter speed dial. I think the dial is on for good.

I wiped down the shutter speed dial with a degreaser and then used a wide masking tape to cover the whole dial. I then used my thumb nail to trace around the dial. Make sure it's a good tight seal before you start to cut around it with a sharp utility knife or razor blade. I hope this helps. :)
 
A very nice job :cool: , That really suits the 3a a treat , I can see that I'm going to have to go the extra 5 yards with my FED 2 to even get near matching that .





Paul
 
Thank you Paul. I'm sure yours will turn out better. Just take your time. It only takes 1 second of carelessness to cause hours of repairs. I'm sure we've all been there.
 
olive bessa r3a owners better look out now! The Russians are Comming! The Russians are Comming!......excellent job.:D
 
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