Painting balsa wood?

[RobL]

Hey all

 

One of the projects I've started recently has balsa wood on it (and will get some more attached to it).  I'm wondering how best to go about painting some of it though.  For the most part I believe I can just slap black/dark coloured paint on and drybrush it. 

 

However there are going to be some parts, made from thin sheet balsa that I want to use the wood grain to my advantage, to achieve a more grey/worn/weathered wood look, although the grain seems to be a little indistinct.

 

Can I get away with airbrushing paint onto balsa wood or should I use a hairy stick?  Should I thin the paint to be more like an ink wash?

 

Anyone here with experience with working with balsa wood able to offer some advice on this?

 

Thanks in advance.

Edited July 17, 2020 by RobL

[Rick Brown]

I personally haven't used balsa for years, but in the old days I used cellulose dope to seal it before painting with hairy stick/Airbrush.

The dope was used because tissue paper was attached to it (RC gliders).

Based on that, I'd seal it first with some sort of varnish maybe? 

Balsa soaks up stuff very easily.

 

Watching with interest, as I've a Balsa Chipmunk to do soonish.

 

HTH,

Rick.

[Max Headroom]

Balsa is porous and needs sealing. Alan ‘balsawood’ Hall used a combination of dope and talc to seal it. This could then be sanded and primed.

 

Trevor

[Tzulscha]

If you're looking for scale wood you might consider Basswood, Limewood or Linden (or whatever you call it over there).

Balsa is quite coarse grained and doesn't look very scale without extra effort.

[NigelD]

Back in my youth, many years ago, i remember using something called sanding sealer on balsa. It raised the grain so sanding was necessary but it gave  a beautifully smooth and sealed surface. 

[Rick Brown]

31 minutes ago, NigelD said:

Back in my youth, many years ago, i remember using something called sanding sealer on balsa. It raised the grain so sanding was necessary but it gave  a beautifully smooth and sealed surface. 

Yep, I remember that. 

I used it quite a bit when young for doing school projects.

Can you still get it?

Rick.

[Mike]

40 minutes ago, NigelD said:

Back in my youth, many years ago, i remember using something called sanding sealer on balsa. It raised the grain so sanding was necessary but it gave  a beautifully smooth and sealed surface. 

I remember sanding sealer too. Its probably still available, as it was widely used to stop up grain in furniture etc as well as in modelling.

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

I have quite a bit of R/C background and agree with the above - it needs sealed. Paint onto unsealed balsa will just make the grain swell out.