I have been using Modern Masters reactive iron paint for a couple years. It is an amazing product. It has iron in the paint that reacts by rusting when you spray it with their rust activator. I have figured out how to make my own rust activator using a mix of vinegar, peroxide and salt. It works every bit as well as theirs. But I am still having to purchase the paint (at $140 a gallon plus shipping!!). I know it needs to have iron added to the paint and that it needs to be iron in the "pre-oxidation" stage . . . which, based on my research so far is ferrous not ferric. Ferric, is already oxidized, meaning it will no longer rust, as it has completed that process already. I tried some powdered ferrous sulphate . . . just mixed it in with latex paint, let it dry and sprayed it with the rust activator. It did nothing, other than to make the paint seem like it had sand in it. I am wondering about a liquid iron . . . either what people take for anemia or perhaps what you feed house plants. I have spent hours looking for this on the internet but so far no real answers. Here is a link to the paint I am referring to.

http://www.modernmasters.com/products.asp?mode=group&gid=68

Thanks for any help you can give me. I am not a scientist, but I would sure love to make my own iron reactive paint! :)

Brenda