Painting question
 

I'm scratch building a 1930's cargo/passenger ship, the Shengking. The hull is fiberglassed, very nearly finished, and quite smooth. What type of paint/painting technique should I use to make the hull look correct? It will be black above the water line, red below. I do not own an airbrush. I’m not planning on painting any rusted areas.

Use spray paint or invest in an airbrush kit from eBay and learn to airbrush. If you decide to airbrush look for either model masters or testors enamel paint. One more thing...to keep the boat looking scale only use flat paint. If you wavy something to look glossy wax it afterwards..gloss paint does not look realistic on scale boats.

Rich.

Just regular flat? I was wondering if some type of satin/egg shell would be the way to go

Gloss does not scale down well. If you were building a modern shine yacht then you can get away with satin finish but for the boat you are building flat is the way to go.

rich.

I actually use a gloss coat as a final check for any waves or depressions in the wood. After having sanded the hull over and over, the gloss coat leaves a mirror finish where imperfections really stand out. When I’m satisfied I sand the gloss coat off with 400/600 paper. I guess it’s time to get an airbrush.

Airbrush is the way to go for a great finish..eBay has airbrushes & compressors that are inexpensive..YouTube has several videos that can guide you on many questions that you might have..

Rich.

I was just on ebay looking at them. What's a good brand to look for, how many psi should the compressor be able to put out?