FNV15 - A PINK Bus?
To paint a bus in Fife Red, you first haven to paint it in pink undercoat, and on 8th April 2001 we did just that...
1. Not
much pink in the first picture, as Alistair starts to undercoat around the
destination box. We used a trailer conveniently parked next to the Viking to
stand on to reach the upper parts of the bus, which was much safer than using
ladders or gantries which can be a bit unstable at times.
2. Gently
does it! Viewing these vsnaps suggests that my friend Alistair does most of the
work! Actually he has more time than me and does correspondingly more, but I
spent most of that day painting hard as well.
3. Looking
down from above, as Alistair continues to paint round the front window. I was
quite keen to get some filming done early on in case my hands got covered in
paint later!
4. Time
for some of my work, in this case the front part of the roof done with a long
reach brush, which I was using on the theory (not mine) that I couldn't mess up
the appearance of the bus painting the middle of the roof!
5. Having
painted the front, it was time for Alistair to move the Viking alongside the
trailer to paint down one side of the roof. Looking interesting already?
6. Vroom,
vroom, cough, cough! After painting it some engine maintenance seems indicated!
Alistair is about to drive carefully down the side of the trailer, to line up
part of the Viking alongside the 8-foot part we were using (the trailer had a
container sitting on most of it).
7. Time
for some large area coverage. I've already painted the nearer half of the middle
roof panels at the front and Alistair follows up by painting the panels I was
leaning on to paint. Doing it this way gave us both an occasional breather, mine
being shorter as I was the one who had to go and move the bus periodically!
8. ;The
undercoat we were using turned out to be quite good quality, covering well and
giving a smooth finish. It was a fairly bright day with some clouds, and was
more than sufficiently mild for undercoating.
9. A couple of moves later
we were approaching the back of the bus, and already the undercoat was
producing a strange three-tone look to the Viking that makes it look like
the property of a commercial bus company rather than a preserved Fife bus!
10. Alistair
stops for a breather, and a grimace at the camcorder! (Surely not at the
cameraman!) The jibs of our preserved cranes are visible in the background, but
I won't mention them here!
11. Three-tone
bus. I didn't film too much in the later stages of painting as we wanted to
finish the roof in a single day and I didn't want to hold up progress too much,
so I missed out on filming the painting of the off-side roof panels.
12. Another view of the Viking
after the roof was undercoated, looking fairly smart (top half anyway) in
the evening sunshine. The next stage of the undercoating was the lower
bodyside, but as we painted the roof on a Sunday that would have to wait...
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