Airbrushing!!! "Everything you wanted to know but were afraid to ask"

[Dustbin]

I have 3 questions that I would like to ask ? 1/ Can I use Isopropanol spray cleaner to clean my airbrush after acrylics 2/ and for cleaning resin parts

3/ Do suction cups work better with or without caps(lids)

Any help gratefully recieved

Paul

[Guest]

I have 3 questions that I would like to ask ? 1/ Can I use Isopropanol spray cleaner to clean my airbrush after acrylics 2/ and for cleaning resin parts 3/ Do suction cups work better with or without caps(lids)

Any help gratefully recieved

Paul

Yes and yes

IPA from the chemist or maplins or ebay will clean up after most acrylics fine, some, (citadel I know), react with neat IPA so either tamiya thinner or a 6% ammonia-water solution to flush first then clean as normal with IPA.

Cap on or off? Makes not one jot of difference unless the breather hole in the cap is blocked and you potentially get a vacuum. I never use mine unless I have a really full paint cup.

[Guest]

I was going to do a bit on fine detail But before we get to that it seems one of the things that put people off airbrushing is the CLEANING!!!!So Here is a guide on how easy it is to keep your brush spick and span

If your airbrush has been unused for a while you may find it has seized or become blocked! If this is the case just disasemble it and soak it in cellulose thinners, this will dissolve all kinds of dried paint, varnish, etc. Then use a pipe cleaner soaked in thinners to clean through the body this will get rid of any last spots of crud. A cotton bud is also indespensible for cleaning the recesses in your paint cup and nozzle (make sure your needle is withdrawn first though) I then find it advisable to use a bit of sewing machine oil soaked in a kitchen towel to wipe the needle before reinserting it into the body (if some of your brushes are as old as mine they will have leather or rubber packing glands this stops them cracking!) the newer ones have teflon seals that need virtually no mntainance.

So you have just used a colour and now you want to switch. There are 2 things that you can do

1 fill the paint resevior with thinner and blow it through untill it sparays clear

2 or as i do i use a product called "Spray Away" This is an Aerosol can containing solvents and 1% machine oil this quickly blasts away any paint build up around the nozzle and will clean out the paint cup in seconds, then a final squirt in the cup blow it through and your ready to continue.

A few tips for you all to save future problems

(a) dont use old paint it seperates and it will clog up your brush as quick as cyno would.

(b) make sure your paint is adequately thinned, the consistency of milk is about right! If not use white spirit with enamels or distilled water or alcohol with acrylics (bear in mind though acrylics with some alcohol base will dry very quickly so dont stop spraying untill your finished!

I'm not entirely in agreement here with the cleaning procedure, now I know some people consider my procedures unecessarily pernickity BUT.........

I speak from several years experience spraying in an auto environment, All the people who laughed and ridiculed me for thoroughly cleaning my own gun after a spray session have at one point or another had to spend at least twice as long stripping and cleaning theirs (or the shop guns, the very reason i had my own, locked in my locker), prior to a spraying session whereas i always was able to mix, load and spray first time everytime.

A quick blow through with thinners / cellulose or 'liquid reamer' if fine between paints during a *session

* a session could be one coat or a whole days worth of spraying with 10 different colours

At the end of said session, before the brush gets packed away in it's case it should be properly and thoroughly cleaned, a brush sprayed through even with xylene or cellulose which is about the most aggressive solvent you will spray will not properly and thoroughly remove all traces of old pigment!

Shortcuts in some respects, as here, are innapropriately named, a shortcut is a means of reaching the same goal in a lesser period of time, if its putting away items, fine, if it's reaching a destination, fine, if it's cleaning a precision instrument, NO, there are no short cuts, it has to be done properly if you expect it to function correctly.

A thorough clean, re-assembly and test can be achieved in as little as 15 minutes once you have the routine in place, 15 minutes well spent at the end of a session knowing that the brush will be perfect and ready for use the next day / week / or even month you pick it up and load it with a fresh paint mix.

The procedure I use is covered in the video below with the one addition, I now clean the tube between the cup and nozzle with an interdental brush, (0.6mm), to ensure that all traces of pigment are removed from the threaded portion.

One final note on cellulose thinner, if you have a brush with rubber seals, the cellulose WILL eventually destroy it, clean it properly after each session and you won't ever need to use cellulose to soak the brush in, if you intend to spray cellulose based paints and clean with it after, keep a supply of O rings handy, or better yet, buy a decent upper end brush, (Iwata CR / BR), with teflon seals. (that said, some of the cheaper brushes, my chinese made one in the cleaning video for example, use teflon seals, you can strip and check yours to see).

Lubricants? Use only lubricants designed for airbrushes, auto sprayguns are built with materials that naturally slip, you are instructed to not use a lubricant of any kind as the introduction of said slippery oily stuff into paint can completely ruin an expensive paint job.

I know some use WD or 3in1 etc but in my opinion it's folly to use any kind of light oil, if you must, then use something like Iwata superlube and then very very sparingly on the back of the needle as you re-insert from the front, I never use any on my Iwata or my cheap brushes and all perform as flawlessly as they did first use. The higher end brushes particularly are made to a standard and precisely machined to fit and work without requiring lubrication.

Sorry for the long post but I felt it necessary to add this.

Otherwise theres some great advice on the operation, use and practise of spraying in this thread.

HTH

Video for cleaning here:

[video=youtube;k9YnScCetDo]

[Guest]

Another showing difference in types

[video=youtube;lJsm9G7Ey1w]