Painting My Gun Question

[Tactical Church]

So im interested in painting my guns but i have a few questions.

How have you all done this in the past. I have seen many photos of quality work but i havent seen how they pulled it all off.

Are there Pros and Cons to painting the gun?
Would appreciate some tips if anyone could.

[VogonFord]

Pros: Can make it look cool, can make it less obvious to the eye.
Cons: If you do it wrong you can mess up your internals, decreases resale value.

That said, I haven't done it, but use your Google-fu for that.

[Darius137]

I have a CA M15A4 and I just made sure to put tape around important areas and then just painted the whole sucker.

I suggest a green based color scheme. I just did simple OD with a few loam stripes. You see a lot of tan painted weapons in military photos, but that's because the military is in deserts. There are less pictures out there of guys in wooded areas. They seem to do a woodland color scheme of brown, tan, black and green.

[Tactical Church]

O true. i havent even tried the arts of the google to find out about this. ok ill search on there

[Tactical Church]

I have a CA M15A4 and I just made sure to put tape around important areas and then just painted the whole sucker.

I suggest a green based color scheme. I just did simple OD with a few loam stripes. You see a lot of tan painted weapons in military photos, but that's because the military is in deserts. There are less pictures out there of guys in wooded areas. They seem to do a woodland color scheme of brown, tan, black and green.

Great. this is awsome info to know.

[Darius137]

I taped up the holes for the site if you have one, taped up the whole flip up site aperature (at least the top half where the peep hole is) and a little tape down the barrel so you can still paint up the flash hider but not in the barrel.

Everything else will just scratch or rub off if it's in a high use area, which is what happens normally anyways.

[quigly]

"Everything else will just scratch or rub off if it's in a high use area..."

Unless you prep it and use quality paint, however all paint will eventually wear off. If you have the time and money(doesn't cost much more then spraypaint) you can get a duracoat kit. You HAVE to do some serious prep(sanding), but the out come is a much more durable finish.

[Darius137]

Unless you prep it and use quality paint, however all paint will eventually wear off. If you have the time and money(doesn't cost much more then spraypaint) you can get a duracoat kit. You HAVE to do some serious prep(sanding), but the out come is a much more durable finish.

True.


The Army usually paints them because after the mission is over and they go back to garrison life in the states they have to remove all the paint and make it able to pass inspection (at least in my units. I'm not special forces, though).

Also, as it chips off, it gives it a very staggered camo that blends in quite well IMHO.

[quigly]

You can always put a pattern on. Duracoat actually sells kits for a HUGE variety of different patterns that would work way better then chipping off paint. Plus looks a lot cooler.

[Darius137]

You can always put a pattern on. Duracoat actually sells kits for a HUGE variety of different patterns that would work way better then chipping off paint. Plus looks a lot cooler.

All personal preference. I paint my web gear, too.

[Hoff]

Adding to what Darius said, ear plug in the barrel works well.

I used krylon and started with a base coat of brown, then added streaks of OD and finally tan.

Also, getting it scratched up just makes it look cooler.

http://www.airsoftpacific.com/album_sho ... ic_id=3084

[Jester316]

A little different cuz it's a bolt:
http://www.airsoftpacific.com/album_pic ... ic_id=3901

I taped off the inner barrel, put paper in the cylinder area, and taped off the scope. I then just did verticle stripes of black, green, and "nutmeg" till I got the look I wanted. I also used sort of a droplet technique where I held the can far enough away to get a misting that left dots in some areas.

[chapped]

Here's my CA M15-A4 that I painted a digital pattern on

I lightly sanded all surfaces with 120 grit.
Completely wiped her down with alcohol.

I created about a half dozen stencils using construction paper. I drew gridwork and randomly cut out sections like a crossword puzzle.

I dropped a Q-Tip into the end of the inner barrel to protect it from paint.
I suspended the rifle from the ceiling of my garage using a wire through the butt stock sling mount.
I applied a dark green base coat over the entire gun and then, once dry, began stenciling the remaining shades. I randomly rotated my stencils and switched colors until I achieved the result I was looking for. (allowing reasonable time for each color to dry before stenciling the next.)
I simply held the stencil against the rifle. By varying the distance between the stencil and the gun I could control how hard or soft the edge definition was.

Once finished I applied about 4 or 5 coats of clear coat in a matte finish.

I then took a large cardboard box and cut slots to match the dimensions of my magazines.
The box was simply to act as a "stand" to hold the magazines erect for painting.
I inserted my magazines roughly the depth of the weapons mag well and repeated the same painting process used on the rifle.
Once complete I had to take sand paper to the top painted edge of the magazines to soften the lip. I was having trouble with insert and release of the magazines into the rifle mag well due to a bit of paint overlap on the areas that seat within the mag well.

Aesthetically I am pleased with how it turned out and the only wear evident so far is located on the sling mounts where metal meets moving metal, which is hardly noticeable.
I used rattle cans of Rustoleum Camouflage.

[Black Fox]

What I did to one of my guns is collected several different leafs from my area and traced them on a thick piece of paper then cut them out. I spray painted the gun brown then laid the leaf patter one at a time and sprayed it various colors, green, light brown. dark, brown, tan and rust. Partially over lapping them hear and there kind of gives it a little dimension. Cluster some here and spread them out there. Avoid making a uniform patter. You can also use twig & grass patters too. In fact I would use all of them. I like to use natural material for my patterns because I feel they make for better camouflage.

If you do use twig and grass, put some in the background and some in the foreground. This adds more dimensions. Also, avoid using black.

Here is a picture that was somewhat similar to my guns but the colors were different.



Also, different patterns are more effective at different ranges. Camouflage with large patterns tend to be effective at longer range. Smaller at close range

[Tactical Church]

Wow i am eating all this up. Thank you all for the advice. im going to have alot of fun with this