The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Here's my first attempt at painting a horn with translucent paint that you see on most red Gem or flowered Vic Jr horns. I painted directly over the bare metal and you must be cautious about not applying too much paint. If you do, you'll just have a painted horn without the translucent look. Be sure your surface is really clean and free particles of any kind. The paint I used was Krylon Stained Glass paint. I've very pleased with the results. Jerry Blais

Jerry,

That looks very good. I've never sprayed a translucent over bare metal, but applied a base coat of either silver or gold. Nice job!

George P.

I've always struggled with gold and silver paint on larger surfaces. It seems much more finicky than other spray paints. Is there such a thing a silver or gold primer? Jerry

I'm not aware of gold or silver primer, but I have applied gold or silver over a primer with no problems.

The original horn manufacturers didn't take such pains - - how did they do it?

George P.

Not sure if this helps Jerry, but when I was younger and worked at an Auto Body shop we would achieve
'Candy Apple Red' by applying a gold base coat followed by several coats of translucent red. The number of coats
of red determined the darkness of the final finish. This type of paint procedure makes it virtually impossible
to ever touch up or repair small areas of the finish properly as the number and consistency of the original red coats would
be extremely difficult to recreate. Most candy apple red finishes were greater than 4 coats of red,less coats would probably be more
what you're after as you definitely don't want a dark candy apple colour on this horn.

But in saying all that, I think the horn looks pretty good the way you have it and wouldn't necessarily try anything different.

Jerry,

Is that "Signor Grinderino" behind the Fireside ?


Very nice job on the horn !


Here's my theory on how these might have been painted: I have a Tea-Tray Co. 11-panel morning-glory, red with Pansies painted on the inside of the bell.

Where the red paint has worn-away, the base metal beneath is (was) bright tin-plated steel. I have seen similar finish on tin-plated kitchenware from the same period.

So, when these horns were new, the steel horn was tin-plated ( like cook-ware ), and had a very bright, silver finish. Then the color-coat was applied ( probably a tinted lacquer), then finally any striping or floral decoration.


That's my theory, anyway.

De Soto Frank wrote:Jerry,

Is that "Signor Grinderino" behind the Fireside ?


Very nice job on the horn !


Here's my theory on how these might have been painted: I have a Tea-Tray Co. 11-panel morning-glory, red with Pansies painted on the inside of the bell.

Where the red paint has worn-away, the base metal beneath is (was) bright tin-plated steel. I have seen similar finish on tin-plated kitchenware from the same period.

So, when these horns were new, the steel horn was tin-plated ( like cook-ware ), and had a very bright, silver finish. Then the color-coat was applied ( probably a tinted lacquer), then finally any striping or floral decoration.


That's my theory, anyway.

True: I repainted a TTCo horn quite a few years ago (which I use on my Home), and the base was obviously tinplate. i polished the rusty spots before painting, but a little silver paint might have been useful.

Bill

Jerry, looks pretty good. I really like the translucent effect.

Clay

Marilyn Monroe is also in the background on a 1952 calendar. That was a VERY good year. Jerry

Jerry how did you get down to bare metal before painting?
It looks very shinny underneath the paint?