Etsy Shop Update - Wooden Toy Car, Hot Rod 1927 T-Bucket From the Hot Rod Freaky Ford Series

Wooden Toy Car, Hot Rod 1927 T-Bucket From the Hot Rod Freaky Ford Series

The body is cut from a solid piece of pine with a scroll saw, not laminated. The paint is various colors of non-toxic acrylic paint. The birch hardwood wheels are finished with amber shellac.

I made these cars with holes for peg people before by drilling the hole before I painted the body. I was never satisfied with the results.  It was hard to paint and sand inside the holes, and I did not think it looked good. The curved bottom made it a challenge to drill the hole verticle. The kids didn't care.

This time I drilled the hole after the painting was done. You need to use a good quality, very sharp, forstner or brad point bit and drill slowly with a drill press to avoid chipping the paint. A bit of blue painters tape may help with this.

I drilled these with the car fully assembled. Drilling after assembly ensures that the hole is vertical and no jigs are required. 

Titebond No-Run, No-Drip Wood Glue - What glue shuld I use for toy making?

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I have been using Titebond No-Run, No-Drip Wood Glue for a few weeks in a recent project I tried several different types of glue to glue the legs on toy dinosaurs. If you have ever made these you know that getting the legs to align correctly is a challenge. Leg position is critical on the dinosaurs that stand on two legs only. I had four types of glue available.

Titebond No-Run, No-Drip Wood Glue

1. TiteBond II
2. Aleene's All Purpose Tacky Glue
3. Elmer's Glue-All Multi-Purpose Glue
4. Titebond No-Run, No-Drip Wood Glue

All of them were slippery but, Titebond No-Run was by far the best. It moved less and set up faster than any of the others. All I had to do was hold the legs in place with a little pressure and then add the clamps. I guess that I didn't need the clamps. However, I'm not that confident.

I have almost stopped using TiteBond II for toys because of the color. I prefer glue that cures clear for painted toys.

Aleene's All Purpose Tacky Glue isn't tacky.  I started with Aleene's but after having to disassemble a couple of toys, clean the glue off of them, sand a reassemble them I decided to try other things.

Elmer's is slippery and slides around just as bad as the first two.

While writing this, I decided that if I make more of these, I should make a template for attaching the legs.

Handmade Wooden Toy - Baby Dinosaur

Etsy Shop Update - Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Hot Rod - 1932 Ford Sedan From the Hot Rod Freaky Ford Series

Handmade Wooden Toy Car, Hot Rod 1932 Ford Sedan From the Hot Rod Freaky Ford Series

I added some new photos to the listing. Some time back Etsy chaanged the number of phots that were allowed from 5 to 10. I'm just getting around to adding some new ones.

I cut this car from a pine 2x4 with my scroll saw. The body is one piece, not laminated thinner stock. TH wheels and the body are both finished with amber shellac. I painted the hubs with metallic blue craft paint to add a bit of color. The exhaust pipes are 1/4-inch dowels painted with flat black acrylic paint.

Yes, six is the correct number of exhaust pipes. These came with flat head 8 engines. The two center cylinders shared a collector to one exhaust. 

New Etsy Shop Listing - Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Bat Car from the Play Pal Series - MDF - Green

Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Bat Car from the Play Pal Series - MDF - Green

 

Experimenting with acrylic paints and MDF on this one. Brush painted with acrylic house paint. Oops paint from Home Depot. No primer, no sealer, just several coats of paint sanding between coats until I was happy with how smooth the surface was.

Flat paint is easier to apply, and it covers better. At least that is the way it seems to me. When I am using acrylic paints, I have to relearn how to paint with it when the color changes.

Free Plans For Bad Bob's Custom Motors Wooden Toy Cars

John Lewman over at ToyMakingPlans.com created these plans for me and released them in the forum. If you are not a member and you are interested in toymaking you should join the fun. My grandson loves these wooden toys.

Bad Bob's Custom Motors Wooden Toy Cars Green & Yellow

Bad Bob's Custom Motors Wooden Toy Cars Yellow

In the Shop - Blue & White Bad Bob's Custom Motors Coupe

Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Bad Bob's Custom Motors - Blue & White

Just out of the clamps. Painting with contrasting colors looks really good but, is tricky to pull off. You have to paint the parts separately masking off the spots where the glue will go.

Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Bad Bob's Custom Motors - Blue & White

Fitting all the parts together after they are painted is quite tedious. There is a risk of damaging the finish with tools or glues.  Being wood, fitment is not precise some parts need to be carefully modified to fit without damaging the paint.

Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Bad Bob's Custom Motors - Blue & White

 If you look closely at the photo above, you can see one tiny spot just above the fender where the paint was scratched off during assembly.

Handmade Wooden Toy Car - Bad Bob's Custom Motors - Blue & White

I learned the hard way that you must clean the jaws of your clamps before clamping painted parts together and be very careful not to touch the toy car with any of the metal parts of the clamps.

Small Quick clamps work well for this sort of clamping, The jaws are easy to clean and padded well. I've not had these stick to anything yet.

What kind of paint are you using for your Bad Bob's Custom Motors cars?

Bad Bob's Custom Motors

I use a variety of paints from various sources. I like the acrylic house paints the best. All of the paints are nontoxic when cured.

 I like to use a white primer to seal the wood and make the colors pop. In this case, I am using Zinsser B-I-N shellac based primer.

 I prefer to use an airbrush for painting toys but, I have to paint outdoors, and the weather where I live does not cooperate, and I have to wait or use a brush. I used an airbrush for these wooden toy cars. My airbrush is a Badger Anthem 155.

 I prefer acrylics over all other paints. They clean up easily, cover well, and are readily available in a vast array of colors. To clean, I flood with water to get rid of the bulk of the paint. The remaining paint is easily removed with ammonia-based cleaners such as window cleaner. I use household$ ammonia to remove dried paint.

 I used the following to paint these wooden toy car bodies.

Pink - Behr Acrylic House Paint
Green - Apple Barrel Gloss Green Acrylic Craft Paint
Blue - Behr Acrylic House Paint - Oops Paint
Yellow - Createx - Airbrush Paint
Red - Apple Barrel Bright Fed Acrylic Craft Paint
Lavender - Behr Acrylic House Paint - Oops Paint
Primer - Zinsser B-I-N