Air Brush Thread

[Martijn Meerts]

I do have a hose with my spray booth, and initially tried to use it, but it ended up too short and stuff to really work with. Since I really only use acrylics (alcohol based like Tamiya and Gunze, and actual water based like Vallejo), I found the venting hose wasn't needed. The filter in the spray booth picks up all the paint particles, so even with the fan blasting against a white wall, there's no problems there.

 

[gavino200]

6 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Gavin,

 

are you going to use organic solvent paints? If not no great need to vent.

 

No. Not at this stage. I think everything I use is acrylic or clearcoat (also acrylic??)

 

 

 

6 hours ago, cteno4 said:

 

if the window can be pullled off you can see about having one made that has a hole cut in it. They may be able to cut one in this one in the shop and reseal and add gas for double pane.

 

other option if window opens far enough is to make a plywood or even cardboard frame around the open edges of the window and put thick insulation tape on the frame to seal against the wall and window edges then put a fitting to attach your exhaust hose to the bottom edge. Just open windows and pop it on when you need it.

 

jeff

 

The window is removable. I'll think about this a little bit while it's on my mind. But I think I'll put off actually doing anything as ti look like I don't need to. 

[gavino200]

2 hours ago, Martijn Meerts said:

I do have a hose with my spray booth, and initially tried to use it, but it ended up too short and stuff to really work with. Since I really only use acrylics (alcohol based like Tamiya and Gunze, and actual water based like Vallejo), I found the venting hose wasn't needed. The filter in the spray booth picks up all the paint particles, so even with the fan blasting against a white wall, there's no problems there.

 

 

Thanks Martjin. That's great to know. I also only use acrylics. Tamiya and Vallejo. And I have a filter and fan built into my design.

[gavino200]

11 hours ago, Kiha66 said:

I'll be interested to see how you progress!  I think that pipe in the last pic may be a drain, it looks like 2 or 3" PVC.

 

The vertical PCV pipe is the radon removal system. I was talking about the right angled conduit that runs the length of the room. 

[cteno4]

5 hours ago, gavino200 said:

The vertical PCV pipe is the radon removal system. I was talking about the right angled conduit that runs the length of the room.

check out the outside of the house where that duct runs into the wall to see if any vents. Where does your dryer vent to? Could you just set it up on top of the washer on on a small table in the laundry room when you need it? That’s what I do with mine now and just swap out the dryer vent hose at the wall. Nice as the sink is right there to clean things up in.

 

if all water based acrylics then the smell is not bad, basically like indoor latex paint. Some are sensitive though. Big thing is that bit of airflow and the furnace filter to just trap as much of the vaporized droplets (airbrushes are good at making really tiny ones) on the filter. All they need to is bump into a fiber and they stick well. It’s not like having to stop tiny dry particles that can bounce thru larger holes.

 

venting outside is really necessary with organic solvents like laquer based paints. Those will rot your brain over time, I know I worked with enough fiberglass boat builders...

 

jeff

[Martijn Meerts]

If I do any painting using laquers, it's always from aerosol cans, and those I usually either spray outside, or on the windowsill with the window wide open. I never use solvent based paint with the airbrush, just not worth all the extra work you get from it, and good quality acrylics with a good quality clear coat are plenty good if you don't handle the models constantly.

[cteno4]

Yeah they tend to vastly shorten the life of many of the o rings too. I gave up spraying organic solvent varnish in the big paint sprayer on larger wood working projects as it was so much a pain to clean out and the o rings cracked so fast. I tried conditioning them with Vaseline and a few other methods I found online but really didn’t help that much (plus you had to clean the o rings before using then). Luckily the acrylic varnishes have improved a lot in the last decade here and I don’t have to wear the organic solvent respirator as well.

 

i too only use rattle cans for lacquer coats and do outside if I can, but it’s a problem here as either too cold outside or if not cold we have a zillion bugs (we live in a forest) and they seem to love the smell of lacquer thinner! So I can just spray in the laundry room in the little booth exhausting outside. Then I just put plastic sheet and old blanket over that over the boot and let cure for a day or two w.o the fan on and it gets enough fresh air to get most all the smell out and not in the house. 

 

jeff

[gavino200]

I was going to make a fancier booth. But since my ventilation needs are minimal I decided to go for even less fancy. Simple box, filter, fan, and turntable. I want to get back to airbrushing with no further ado. 

 

 

[Martijn Meerts]

Hey, as long as it works, it's a good booth 😄

 

[cteno4]

What ever works! Basically what I used for 20 years! Box that was from container store as it was the same dimension as a very common furnace filter I would put in the back like 3” From the back and separated with some hot glued cardboard strips. Then a 10” square cut out in the back for a mini box fan and some cardboard strips hot glued to make a sleeve for it to fit in. I think I went thru like 4 boxes after getting wet crushed or just abused too much in the shop!

 

im getting old and instead of making a new one a couple of years ago I broke down and bought one of the little fold up units (probably the same one as Martijn on a good sale and it’s been nice to hace now and just use in the laundry room and use the dryer vent.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Here you go, MacGyver your own siphon airbrush! Quite fun.

 

 

think I’ll stick with the $11 harbor freight, I have enough projects to play with! The harbor freight is really nice for quickly switching paint jars if you are doing scenery stuff. Not a beautiful double action gun, but it works! It even works with cheap craft paints thinned some as the larger pigment particles can make it thru the nipple easily. Takes a little messing with but useful!

 

https://www.harborfreight.com/quick-change-airbrush-kit-93506.html

 

cheers

 

jeff

[gavino200]

Very clever. 

[Tony Galiani]

I was watching a Cityscape Studio video and he uses a SPARMAX Flyer-SR which looks like a neat airbrush for someone who has little experience and really doesn't need or plan to do a lot of airbrushing.  It looks very low maintenance as the paint can be stored in the bottles ready for use in the unit.  Does anyone here have an experience with these?

Ciao,

Tony

[katoftw]

I have no experience with the product.  But I googled a few sellers that sell the bottles.  A 2 pack of extra bottles costs the same as the gun cost.  Seems like a fiscally poor option.  And it aint the cheapest gun around.

 

Unless you are paint heaps of different colours at a time.  I see this an an over engineered product.  For similar costs, you could have 3 spray guns and plummed up to an air source.  Only takes 2-3 minutes to clean out and/or change colours.

 

I only just since xmas started using a air gun.  Wish I had done so sooner.  Cleaning and painting with then ain't that difficult.  I've only got the one gun, and I dont really struggle changing colours.  I go slow, so don't need multiple colours all at once.

Edited November 6, 2022 by katoftw

[inobu]

Better off with a Paache Talon......Its gravity fed with a large top cup. If you use an eye dropper to add a few drops of paint in the cup clean up

and change color will be fairly easy. 

 

The SPARMAX Flyer-SR look nice but you need to still clean the swap out the bottle then fill the bottle. Its is a good replacement for rattle cans.

 

The control with an airbrush is much better as well.

 

I have Paasche 3 VL's, 3 Talon and 2 Infinity Harder Steenbeck. (Just to show the levels). For the bulk of the work the Talon's serves best.

Get a Talon you can do more with it.

 

You can see I have added the Talons since the original post. The Inifinity is expensive. 

 

Inobu

Edited November 7, 2022 by inobu

[cteno4]

I agree with inobu a simple gravity fed airbrush works great and is pretty easy to clean. Between colors you just run some cleaner thru the airbrush for a bit till is sprays with no color, then drop in the next paint. Once done with the session it’s best to throughly clean the airbrush. with acrylics I’ve had few times where the brush got really gunked up and required taking it apart. But when you do usually acrylics fall off in the little ultrasonic bath or with a bit of scrubbing. Even the cheap harbor freight brushes work pretty well only big downside of cheaper airbrushes is getting replacement parts like O rings is usually impossible. With the big name airbrush companies you can get parts readily.

 

if you want a very inexpensive airbrush that you can swap colors w.o any cleaning is an external mix siphon airbrush. These work by having the air from the brush blow past a nipple on the bottle and this creates suction to pull pint up and into the air stream. This is useful when doing scenery, it’s not a fine spray you want for models, but perfect for painting large areas of scenery and blending colors. It can also use cheap craft paint thinned with latex paint thinner, which don’t work well in internal mix airbrushes. 

 

cheers,

 

jeff

[Martijn Meerts]

Gravity fed is actually easier to use, even with swapping colours. Especially with a lot of model paints these days coming in eyedropper bottles. Empty eyedropper bottles are also readily available if you need to mix custom paints and keep them for longer periods.

 

Also, often forgotten, but make sure you get a decent compressor with an air tank, so it keeps pressure even. A good compressor can make a cheap airbrush work reasonably well, but a bad compressor can make the most advanced airbrushes feel worthless 🙂

 

[cteno4]

35 minutes ago, Martijn Meerts said:

Also, often forgotten, but make sure you get a decent compressor with an air tank, so it keeps pressure even. A good compressor can make a cheap airbrush work reasonably well, but a bad compressor can make the most advanced airbrushes feel worthless 🙂

Very very true!

 

jeff

[katoftw]

Inexpensive ones on ebay with the 3L tanks do the job nicely.

[cteno4]

Yes a small tank helps even pressure a lot but need a decent pressure regulator. Tankless work well but decent ones are not cheap.

 

has anyone tried these new usb charged cake decoration air brushes? Figured they were not for any fine scale painting, but may be nice and hardy for scenery or priming big stuff. Worry they may sputter a bit.

 

jeff