I know that Grandt Line has scale rivets, bolts, etc. for our model railroading brothers. The nearest specialty RR shop is a hundred miles away, so before making the trip...do any of you know if they make items small enough for our scale? (Like for sand skirts now that Konrad has ruined my day. )

Hi Pete -

George Bradford turned me on to a great way to do round-headed rivets quickly and easily, and cheaply, too.

Go to Michael's craft store and pick up some T-shirt paint. The stuff I have is called "3D Paint", and the brand name is "Scribbles". I put a blob in a beer cap, and use a 0.010" piece of guitar string to make 0.015" diameter rivet heads. With a little practice, you can make very consistent dots of this paint that don't shrink down to being flat, but stay rounded. It helps to have your rivet rows pre-marked. To make bigger rivets, simply use a larger diameter tool. Try to avoid the glitter and dark colours, as it's harder to cover with paint.

There is also a company called "Scale Hardware" that makes tiny brass rivets and bolt heads, but you have to drill holes for them. They have many sizes, but are sized more for 1/35, so even the smallest ones are a touch big for 1/48.

Hope that helps you out -

Malcolm

Hi Malcolm;

Glad to hear you mastered using the 3D Paint method for rivets, and I have found that there are NUMEROUS other applications for this great little product.
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One of the best is for those little white balls on the width indicators on German fendered vehicles, etc. Find some fine straight wire, dip the tip into white 3D paint, and hang upside down using tape or whatever. The little ball will harden to a perfect round tip. If you screw up, just scrape it off and try again. Best to make about 4 at a time and then choose the best two for your project.

Great stuff, and not expensive...

George Bradford
AFV NEWS

Grandt line has "O" scale parts {nice doors and windows for dioramas} and all the nut and bolts you could want BUT, I would call first. Many of the RR hobby shops in my area {Los Angeles, Orange county} don't always have the O scale in stock and most order from Walther's which has a minimum order so they don't place an order until they have enough to place the order.

Grandt Line also will sell direct. So does Walther. Many of the RR shops do as well. I spent some time trying to find my turnbuckles for the SuperPershing.

also here is another link to a company that does the nuts and bolts

http://www.scalehardware.com/

I'll visit the RR shop when I get the chance, look for O gauge...

But the bit about t-shirt paint sounds so damn inneresting I just have to give it a go...I'll post the results.

Hi Pete -

You will be surprised how well it works. I was skeptical at first, but faced with a scratchbuild with more than 800 rivets on it, to me it seemed the path of least resistance. No holes to drill, no glue required . I spent ten minutes practicing, and set to. By the end of the evening session (four hours), I had 500 of them done, and the rest went down the next evening no problem. It was a total anticlimax after sweating how to do them for a month.

This method will make little dome heads, but not hemispheres, unless you do each one twice to make them more pronounced.

Looking forward to hearing how it goes -

Malcolm

PS - Forgot to mention, another advantage to this method, if you screw one up, wipe it off and do it over, it's totally forgiving.

Grandt Line also makes stuff in HO and N gauge. Some of these might be more to the right size. I usually use a mixture of O and HO rivets, bolts, and NBW's - whatever looks right.

While at the AMPS show I discoverd on the Archer vendor display a decal set for rivets. The decal set has sscale rivets in different sizes, all lined up in rows. The decals feature a raised rivet by having decal film overlaid on a resin dot. I plan on trying them out on my Kengi Grant and Lee tanks, where the lower hull rivets are in straight lines. The set can be obtained from Archer Decals. Cheers, Alan Vandam