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Grigori
05-19-2014, 01:26 AM
Hi all :)

I'm preparing for a build. I'd like to have some pieces powder coated the black-chrome (smoky grey sort of colour) TCSS offer, with the recessed areas in the hilt fully black. I contacted Tim who advised that it's not possible to do two different powder coat colours on areas that are touching on the same part, so can't fully achieve this with PC. So I am looking at alternatives. I'm thinking of getting the colour I want where I want it, and leaving the other areas raw which is possible and a standard option on TCSS. And then either painting, or aluminium-black-ing the exposed aluminium parts to get the black I want there.

I've not used aluminium black before, so unsure if that would give a good dark and consistent colour like I want or not. If not, I may be better to spray paint black and wipe the overflow off the PC'd areas.

Would love any advice!
G

Sevinzol
05-19-2014, 02:48 AM
I would just use a good enamel paint and maybe bake it a little in a low oven. Recessed areas wont need the wear resistance of PC.

spray paint black and wipe the overflow off the PC'd areas.
They make masking tape that has Super Absobent Polymers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superabsorbent_polymer) in it now. This will keep paint from creeping under the tape. I'm not sure if they have it down under, but the name brand in the US is called Frogtape (http://frogtape.com/index.php/). Works great on house paint.

Grigori
05-19-2014, 03:02 AM
Thanks Sevinzol! Would enamel paint stick on top of powder coat? I wonder if I'd need to leave areas raw to use enamel, or if I could fit in the recessed by painting straight over the powered coat.

Sevinzol
05-20-2014, 07:33 PM
I would definately mask the PC parts or you will get a mess. Enamel paint is much tougher than 'housepaint' which is latex based. Enamel paint can be found in automotive or farm implement sections of stores. https://www.duplicolor.com/ sells enamels that are designed to paint engine blocks and look like anodized aluminum. The parts that come from TCSS are not mirror finished so you can probably just degrease them and spray directly (especialy since they are recessed areas). Otherwise you would have to use a primer. Might want to give this thread a read for future experiments TCSS Forum: How-to-The-basics-of-painting (http://forums.thecustomsabershop.com/showthread.php?540-How-to-The-basics-of-painting&highlight=basics%20painting)

Grigori
05-21-2014, 03:12 AM
Thanks again Sevinzol, that is really useful! I'd missed that thread in my searching some how. Thanks for the link!

Grigori
06-06-2014, 04:56 PM
I've been continuing to look into this, and trying to finalise a design that appeals to me aesthetically, and that is doable from a colour and also fitting the insides in successfully. I think I am just about done. Got my body parts in mind clearly now, and colours for all but the blade holder are decided. I've got three variations in mind for the colour on the blade holder. I'm trying to decide between these three different uses of wet black, black chrome and olive green which is my tri-colour scheme.

Option 1 is the easiest cause it could all be done with powder coating by Tim at TCSS, and has a bit of bare aluminium left which might be nice and brighten up otherwise darker shaded design.
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Option 2 would require me to paint the recesses in the blade holder and also the matching connector to keep them the same (as Sevinol has explained how to do above, thanks again). Tim's confirmed he could lathe out the recesses after powder coating reading to be prepared for painting.
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Option 3 is closest to my original idea, but seeing it all together I think I like this option the least now, as it's a little too dark.
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As you can see I like a really simple sort of design, not a lot of greeblies or such. I'm thinking to have brass buttons, possibly a green power LED and a red low power LED using the PLI function all of which I'd want to mount on the black extension behind the blade holder, and my main blade colour would by a cyan sort of blue/green. D ring attached to the pommel vent.

Any voters I'd love to hear your opinions :) Until now I've seen only one saber in person, which is the one I purchased from GCS. So I'm making a lot of judgements from online pictures and hoping in reality it looks like I expect.

amwolf
06-06-2014, 06:09 PM
I like option #1; you might consider omitting the black chrome coating on the pommel and asking Tim if he could power coat with the olive green just the recessed section just up from the large "fat" section. This would emulate the olive in the reveals on the blade holder, and IMO help tie the whole scheme together. Gives the olive center section a [visual] purpose... You could also see about getting the pommel insert coated black chrome. I really like the black chrome pc, it's really rich looking.

Grigori
06-07-2014, 12:12 AM
Thanks amwolf! That is an interesting idea, I was so focussed on a chrome black metal look, that when I started thinking about keeping the blade holder bare, I didn't give any thought to the other parts. Below Option 4 as per your suggestion.
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I agree would be good to pc the pommel vent if I used pc on the whole pommel. Or potentially could even ask Tim to do the olive green grove as you suggested, but make the butt and the pommel vents black chrome. I guess that is option 5. Tim did say he could do two colours in this way, as they're not contacting each other.
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