Howdy, new member here. I build mainly armor and aircraft but dabble in other stuff as well.

Question about painting tank tracks, specifically the plastic ones like the ones in Dragon smart kits.

I've seen tutorials that show installing tracks then painting. How can you get around all he road wheels etc to do a nice paint and weathering job?

I'd like to install first because it's hard to glue the tracks after painting unless I use super glue.

Thanks for any advice.

Rob

Robert,

Feel like i should give you an answer after posting to your "Hello" posting.
Wish I had a really good answer but I don't. I can only relay my techniques and experiences. I have done both; installing tracks after as well as installing then painting. Obviously, after is much easier for painting and weathering but sometimes it is not that easy to do with some tracks.
When you can't do them separately it can be a chore sometimes. I would use a nice dark shadow color for the running gear in that situation to try and pre-hide any bare plastic or primer. Then work slow knowing that you may have to come back and touch up any little areas that didn't get the intended coverage.
One trick that does help if you can pull it off is to attach the running gear; road wheels, idlers, drives, etc. but do NOT glue them on to the axles. Attach the track around the wheels, etc.with liberal amounts of cement on the track-wheel mating surfaces. Allow this to dry thoroughly (I give it 24 hours) and then CAREFULLY slide the whole assembly of of the axles. This gives you a running gear/track assemble that can be painted and weathered on both sides much easier before you attach it to the vehicle. Hope that makes some sense.

Cheers,
Rick

It is a nuisance, but an alternative is to hand paint the inner faces of the links prior to assembly. taking care not to get paint on the gluing surfaces. If you're ambitious, you can paint the outer surfaces, as well, but these are generally not so difficult to reach after installation.

You’ll probably get as many different answers as you will people who respond. Anyway here’s my method for assembling and painting tracks.

I use either the Testors cement or Tamiya Ultra-thin. I assemble the entire run for one side on a piece of 1” blue painters tape. I then slather cement all along the underside of the tracks (where the guide horns are). I give it 5 minutes to set then run the tracks along all the running gear starting and ending in the middle of the drive sprocket. I don’t glue the ends together though. Just fit them together and hold the joint in place with a piece of tape. I let the side dry for 24 hours then take the tape off. The tracks will separate where you fit them together (but didn’t glue them) in the middle of the drive sprocket. You can take them off the running gear now and paint them then refit them and glue those two links together. You’ve now got a fully assembled set of tracks on that side. Do the same for the other side and you’re good to go!

Hope that helps!