Is Airbrushing Really This Much of a Pain?

[bigbluesd]

I'm at the end of my rope and I need some help. I bought this: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004KNFOLS/ref=oh_details_o00_s02_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1 at the end of last year along with a small compressor. At first it was great and I was convinced that airbrushing was the way to go (especially since I was getting tired of all the waste of rattle cans and the cumbersome brushing of small parts).

I did one model car with the airbrush and it went really well, no real problems to speak of. Fast forward to my second car though and it's a nightmare. The airbrush will not consistently shoot paint, period. I have cleaned and cleaned and cleaned and everything appears to be immaculate. I can even shoot water through it onto a CD and get a nice fine mist, but as soon as I put any paint (regardless of how thin I make it) it just stops spraying. I can turn the pressure up to 45 (I have been going around 20) and get occasional spurts of paint but it just won't spray continuously no matter what I try.

The needle does not appear to be damaged, nor does the nozzle (as far as I can tell, that booger is tiiiiiiny). It's a 0.3mm nozzle.

I am assuming that "buy a better airbrush" is the answer, is that right? Would I be better to buy something with a .35mm or .4mm nozzle, will that help this problem?

Dropping $100 on an airbrush right now is out of the question, should I be okay buying a used Iwata or Paacsh off of eBay, or are they usually junk if used?

[Casey]

I am assuming that "buy a better airbrush" is the answer, is that right? Would I be better to buy something with a .35mm or .4mm nozzle, will that help this problem?

I think so. $16.99 is really at the low end, lower than those Testors propellant powered plastic airbrushes. $100 seems to be about right for a good quality airbrush, so save your pennies, and keep an eye out at Michael's, Hobby Lobby, or at online retailers.

Definitely check out this site, too: https://sites.google.com/site/donsairbrushtips/

[Erik Smith]

A seal might have been damaged when you cleans it for the first time. That could be causing erratic spraying. Are there grommets that seal the nozzle parts to the body or are they compression?

[935k3]

check all the o-rings and seals for pinching or distortion. Chinese knock offs use allot of extra seals due to poor machining tolerances.

[bigbluesd]

A seal might have been damaged when you cleans it for the first time. That could be causing erratic spraying. Are there grommets that seal the nozzle parts to the body or are they compression?

check all the o-rings and seals for pinching or distortion. Chinese knock offs use allot of extra seals due to poor machining tolerances.

All of the seals that I can see are O-rings and are external to the paint flow (on the outside of all threads), could these still make it clog? They appeared to be in good condition until I l got frustrated in the middle of all this and soaked the nozzle in mineral spirits for about an hour, that killed the O-ring on the nozzle. Are there ever any kind of seals on the inside of the airbrush body (in areas that are inaccessible?)

[Bill J]

The nozzle size seems pretty small for model paint. Most good airbrushes use something like 0.5 or larger. For like $60 you can buy a Paasche Millenium set or a Passche VL set, both are great airbrushes. I've used my VL for 20+ year without a single failed part.

Coast Airbrushes has good prices and service, take a look at their choices. I personally prefer a siphon feed with the external bottles, to me they are less hassle, some prefer the gravity feed, pick one and go with it. Good luck.

[bigbluesd]

The nozzle size seems pretty small for model paint. Most good airbrushes use something like 0.5 or larger. For like $60 you can buy a Paasche Millenium set or a Passche VL set, both are great airbrushes. I've used my VL for 20+ year without a single failed part.

Coast Airbrushes has good prices and service, take a look at their choices. I personally prefer a siphon feed with the external bottles, to me they are less hassle, some prefer the gravity feed, pick one and go with it. Good luck.

I thought the same thing, I like the idea of a siphon feed because changing colors seems so instant and effortless. Is the cleaning/maintenance any more difficult with this type of brush?

[bigbluesd]

The nozzle size seems pretty small for model paint. Most good airbrushes use something like 0.5 or larger. For like $60 you can buy a Paasche Millenium set or a Passche VL set, both are great airbrushes. I've used my VL for 20+ year without a single failed part.

Coast Airbrushes has good prices and service, take a look at their choices. I personally prefer a siphon feed with the external bottles, to me they are less hassle, some prefer the gravity feed, pick one and go with it. Good luck.

Follow-up question since I am looking at a Paasche VL set on Amazon at the moment... the cup that comes with some of these sets, it looks like a gravity feed cup that you can use instead of the siphon cups, does it work the same way?

[crazyjim]

Paasche H series single actions worked well for me, but then I traded it for some kits and bought an Iwata. I get much better results with the Iwata.

All I do to clean is remove the needle, wipe it down with lacquer thinner, lube it, and reinstall. Wipe the bowl out real good with lacquer thinner. Remove the nozzle and wipe with lacquer thinner. Bing bang and maybe a minute later, it's clean.

For painting different colors real quick, I just blow any paint out, shoot some lacquer thinner through and change colors.

Edited March 24, 2014 by crazyjim

[DirtModeler]

A lot of people seem to prefer gravity feed over siphon feed. I'm the opposite. I get too into what i'm painting with a gravity feed and end up dumping paint out of the cup.. i did it more then once..

Now i only use siphon feeds.. i can turn the airbrush upside down and it has little effect on what i'm spraying.

[DirtModeler]

As far as buying a used airbrush. if you stick with the big 3 (Iwata, Paasche, Badger), you should be fine with a used one. You might have to spend some time cleaning and lubing it.. maybe buying a new needle.. but My Iwata is 15 years old and still runs like the day i got it..

I've heard similar claims from users of the other big 3 airbrush mfg's.

[ScaleDale]

If the seal in the nozzle is lost, then the AB won't have the pressure it needs to properly shoot paint from the cup. Airbrushes are like traditional brushes. You can get them at low cost and pick hairs out of your paint or spend your money for better bristles and not worry about it. I wouldn't trust an AB under 75-100 USD

Dale

[Doug Bowen]

I just bought a Binks Model B unit used on e-bay or Amazon (don't remember) for $37. Got it in 3 days, and it works great. Simple, single action gun. I decant DupliColor and it works fine right out of the can.

It was a gamble, but it was only $37. Might be worth a chance before you drop a lot of money.

Just my 2 cents,

D

[Modelmartin]

The Paasche H is a sturdy workhorse for an airbrush. Tips, nozzles and needles are easily found on Ebay for a few bucks each. A used one at worse will need 20 bucks of parts to make perfect again.

There really isn't a need for a dual action airbrush for model cars unless you are doing some wild custom paint designs.

Edited March 24, 2014 by Modelmartin

[Mike Kucaba]

If it sprays water and your paint is as thin as that, it should spray paint. Do you strain your paint?

[bigbluesd]

No, I don't strain it but I do mix the everloving #$&^$#* out of it before shooting.

I think I am going to buy the Paasche set. I also saw this Badger model on eBay for like $10, does anybody know if it would be useful for general use? http://www.badgerthayer.com/350.html

EDIT: Okay, I ordered the Paasche VL on Amazon for $65 and I think I will try and grab one of the 350s as well since it is so dirt cheap. For $75 I will have two airbrushes, one double action and one external single action. I'm a little hesitant about the siphon action but I figure the big benefit is that I can keep a few bottles premixed with my most used colors (aluminum, satin black, etc.) and use the cup for the one-offs. Thanks for all of the feedback!

Edited March 24, 2014 by bigbluesd

[Art Anderson]

Regardless of the type of airbrush, or it's price--when one is working with a syphon-type unit and getting intermittent spray, chances are pretty good that air is getting admitted into the material (paint) delivery side of things. That can be aggravating as all get-out to find, as usually it's something so small and simple as to defy all reason at times.

However, tracking it down isn't hard, truthfully: Start with the material (paint) delivery tube that extends down into your color jar: Does this tube reach all the way to the bottom of the jar (hint: It takes only a little bit of clearance between the bottom of the jar and the end of this tube to allow paint to flow into, and up through the tube to the airbrush). Next, check the top of the delivery tube where it meets the underside of the color jar "nipple"--is that a tight fit, and if a plastic tube (most are nowadays) is there even the tiniest of splits in the tube at that point? If so, it should be easy enough to reverse the installation of the delivery tube as any little crack or split in that end more than likely will be immersed in your paint until that last few dregs of paint are left in the color jar.

The next thing to check would be any seals around the base of the hollow nozzle--those will admit air, with the "vacuum" (which is slight, but nonetheless a vacuum) inside the venturi of the airbrush itself. If that seal is missing, or split, replacing it should go a long way to correcting the problem, or so it seems to me.

Art

[Bill J]

The Paasche VL should serve you well. Good airbrush with parts availability being a big plus in the long haul. As far as the Badger 350 goes, for $10 it should be a good deal. I have one but have not used it in decades, it is simple but it tends to split the tip if the needle point is screwed in too much and then it will spit paint and be useless.

The cup does work like a cup on a gravity feed and you can use it or not use it. I know some on here really prefer the gravity feed airbrushes but it escapes me why that it. The gravity feed models are generally geared toward graphic artists that use inks and their paint surface is one dimensional, like a piece of canvas or a photo being touched up. That makes spilling paint everywhere much less likely than when painting 3D objects like engine parts or shock absorbers on a parts tree. A closed gravity feed would probably be a good option but hardly an open top. Cleaning a bottle and a cap is not that hard and swapping paints is much easier for me.

I bought several different size bottle adapters, so I can screw a cap right onto some Testor's Metalizer and start spaying parts. If I am painting all the parts for a car, I start at the lightest color metalizer and just screw that same cap (uncleaned between) to the next darker color until I work to gunmetal color. No cleaning between color changes, just unscrew the cap and screw it onto the next color. I clean when finished.

With color paints I do clean between colors or use multiple adapter caps. I also have a cap that screws directly onto Alclad bottles and Scalefinishes paint bottles. I only use the empty glass jars when I have to mix thinner and paint, like the Testor's enamels. I prefer premixed paints when I can get them.

One other note, the VL and the Badger 350 siphon nozzles are at different angles and you have to have separate cap adapters or risk spilling paints with bottles at odd angles.

[bigbluesd]

Bill, that workflow sounds really good and that is something that is very important to me because I only get an hour and a half or so at a time to work on these things. It usually takes me a couple of painting sessions to get basic color on all of the parts when you factor in setup time, clean-up time and breakdown time.

[Chief Joseph]

FWIW, I have one of those same Chinese guns that picked up several years ago. It's not my first-line choice, nor even my second or third, but it works well to be so cheap. I use beeswax on all the threads because it does tend to have air leaks.

[bigbluesd]

FWIW, I have one of those same Chinese guns that picked up several years ago. It's not my first-line choice, nor even my second or third, but it works well to be so cheap. I use beeswax on all the threads because it does tend to have air leaks.

Bill, would an air leak cause the kind of problems I described (no output at all except occasional "burps" of paint)?

[Bill J]

I have no experience with that particular airbrush, so it is hard to say. If you had air leaks you would hear them when not spraying. The fact that it worked initially and the second time did not, it sounds more like dry paint in the tip or on the needle. The other possibility, as others have mentioned, is that the gaskets/packings/o-rings have been damaged, possibly by the type solvent used to clean the brush.

I would expect with that design and nozzle size that the airbrush is produced with some medium like ink in mind. Artists are mostly into acrylic inks these days and water cleanup. Some solvents, particularly strong solvents like lacquer thinner can damage gaskets, depending on the material the gasket is made of. Most of the higher end airbrushes either have very close tolerances without gaskets or use material like Teflon that handles strong solvents. The Paasche VL has all Teflon for instance.

My first airbrush, which I still use is a Badger 200 single action, siphon fed unit. I painted some camo paints on an airplane and all was good until I left the airbrush sit awhile. I had done a token cleaning on it. The next time I went to use it I had problems, it spit choked and sprayed funky. A friend that had been using one for some years told me I had dry paint in the tip. We soaked it in lacquer thinner awhile and then ran some thread through the tip, white thread and it came out green from bringing old paint with it. Since then I have kept them all clean and never had another problem with the Badger. I use it for most metalizers and some small part painting.

So, try a through cleaning of the nozzle and needle and perhaps buy some acrylic ink at an art store made for airbrushing and try spraying it. You for sure have a small diameter nozzle/needle for model paints, so that will effect it's abilities. The Paasche VL, if you use the size "3" nozzle is twice the size of your Chinese airbrush, I recall 0.78 being the size of the "3" needle/tip combo.

[DrewCfromSC]

what type of paint are ou having trouble with? Water base or solvent base? Im new to an airbrush had similar problems and it ws my fault for not reducing paint with the proper reducer and adjusting the pressure to a constant 30psi at the airbrush.

[vwdave92]

Acrylic paint. Auto Air, Tamiya, Wicked Colors, Aztek. What ever. The clean us is WAY easier.

[my80malibu]

No, I don't strain it but I do mix the everloving #$&^$#* out of it before shooting.

I think I am going to buy the Paasche set. I also saw this Badger model on eBay for like $10, does anybody know if it would be useful for general use? http://www.badgerthayer.com/350.html

EDIT: Okay, I ordered the Paasche VL on Amazon for $65 and I think I will try and grab one of the 350s as well since it is so dirt cheap. For $75 I will have two airbrushes, one double action and one external single action. I'm a little hesitant about the siphon action but I figure the big benefit is that I can keep a few bottles premixed with my most used colors (aluminum, satin black, etc.) and use the cup for the one-offs. Thanks for all of the feedback!

I have that one it was a good brush in the beginning, you need to keep it clean. I have not used it for a long time. I have been gathering Parts to repair it, and get it back in service. Most of my AB line up is badger brands. I have several others too. I have never tried a Paasche, Although I am sure they are every bit as good as a Badger.