Tinting clear styrene

[HO RacePro]

Nylon takes tints and dyes readily. There are clear grades of nylon. Nylon is highly hydroscopic -- absorbs moisture -- so a soak in a water/dye solution should do the trick. Starting with dry nylon should help. Nylon can be dried by heating to 160°F - 180°F. Thin Nylon, such as you'd use for a model windshield, should dry quickly.

Ed Bianchi

[RichD]

I looked again and found the clear colors on the Tamiya website.

[SouthShoreRacing]

I’m not sure what Rich is talking about. Tamiya has clear red, orange, and yellow. They may have others, but those are the ones I use for taillights, etc.

[Eric Peterson]

Auto World is showing window tint in black. They also show a selection of paint colors from Master Modeler.

[RichD]

Rit dye should work, boiling water is not hot enough to soften clear styrene plastic. You might need to suspend the plastic so that it does not touch the bottom of the pan. The dyed plastic might scratch easily. I was wondering if you could put a little Rit dye in some Future and paint the inside of the glass with that.

[Revtor]

I’d try Rit dye or the like before coatings. Boiling water will soften the plastic so maybe overnight in room temp water?

[RichD]

Since the Testors website has gone dead I could not find out what they called their clear paints. Back in the '60s candy colors were popular. If you wanted Candy Apple Red you first sprayed a gold base coat and put clear red over that.
My local Hobby Lobby still has a fair selection of Testors paints. The other day they were out of yellow, so I went to the hardware store and got some Rust-Oleum yellow enamel spray.

[keven]

You could try a spray candy color.

is that the same as a ‘clear’ color?
just go lite with the candy spray?

looking @ some RIT dye, too…
I’m better at boiling water.

[ElCamino]

Have had some success spraying on window tint. 1st used Testors rattle can transparent colors. Not much control over spray pattern or volume. Next used Createx Transparent colors with some mixing clear, sprayed with an air brush. Result were better. Just ordered some Createx candy colors from Spraygunner. Hoping for even better results.

[RichD]

You could try a spray candy color. I would have suggested Testors, but Rust-Oleum bought them a while back and has dropped the entire line. Tamiya does not list any candy colors, some dealers may still have Testors paints in stock.

[keven]

Anyone done tinting of clear plastic or clear styrene?
mite try mod podge with some food coloring and a bit of h20….
dunk and drip dry.
or I could brush it on litely.
any other options/methods for tinting?