After letting the paint dry completely for a day or so, I then started masking up in preparation for painting the stock and grip. I also tried to mask some of the finer details that I wanted to keep as black (or silver) – the indent on the base of the stock, the 8 screws on the grip and the screw on the butt.
I masked the fine lines and covered the rest with newspaper and started to apply a series of thin layers of brown.
Once the brown was touch dry, I carefully removed the paper and tape and I will let the brown dry for another 24 hours before I do any more work on it.
There was a couple of very small areas where I didn’t mask well enough and a light dusting of brown came through, but I will be able to fix that up with some judicious weathering.
After consulting a couple of experts – Cyclops and Cueloopz – I was steered towards the technique of Dry Brushing for the weathering effects I wanted.
I chose Humbrol Silver for weathering on black and Humbrol Black for weathering the stock and the muzzle. Using a fine hair brush I dry brushed the silver onto anywhere where I thought wear and tear might take place on the barrel. Having never done this before I was a bit ham-fisted, so tried to use the “less is more’ principle.