New Air brush

I've been after an Airbrush for a while, today i finally got one.

Its Nothing special not a top of the range system from a reputable company like Badger or similar but its one to get started with and dosnt actually hurt the wallet!

The Kit you can pick up on ebay for £65 with free next day p&p, so value for cash you can't knock what you get in the box...

One air brush Compressor with water trap and adjustable pressure with gauge.

2 Air brushes, (both Chinese unbranded but they both work fine) 1 gravity feed/side feed and 1 siphon feed. (both dual action)

one good length of braided rubber air hose.

One English manual ( although that just covers the problem solving and spare parts guide )


Well after it arrived first thing i did was put it all together and start playing.

I've played with other airbrushes in the past and i have to say for the price i paid i cant regret the purchase and so far the machine seams able to spray very well, from an easy 30 psi wide spray right down through 25,20,15, 12 and 7 psi for detailed close up work.

I've only tested with so far with my Revell aqua paints, simply because they only require a 20% water to paint ratio, i've yet to test enamels and the tamiya acrylics as enamels require thinners and the only tin i have is my good stuff for my epoxy varnish, and Tamiya paints are hard work and especially hard to thin down without buying tamiya's own thinner ( which is expensive, 100ml for £6 - 8+ p&p )

In all honesty Revell Aquas will be my main paint medium for now until i start exploring other brands of paint so from what i can tell so far the air brush and compressor are holding up well, it will take a bit of practice but my first few attempts seamed to go well very little splatter or runs, One thing i can say for certain is i won;t be going back to rattle cans any time soon going by my practices. 

So in conclusion on first thoughts, if your new to air brushing, don't want to spend a massive amount to try it out or even only paint on the odd occasions then this is worth its value in the long run well see how it holds up over the next 6 months and ill keep the post updated, if i get 18-24 months regular use out of this i will be very impressed.

So some photos... and i'll add some once i start doing some painting.

Can you put up a link to where you got the kit please RR as I soon want to get back into painting again.

Here's the exact one I have's link...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/262787237714

Thanks RR, looks a good toy

Just an update on some airbrush usage, I’ve been playing with it regularly now, just as proof of its ability’s my dad asked me a couple of weeks back to paint his IOM which is a rather huge boat to say the least, right now it’s just the base coat of colour but again it’s a lot of boat but thanks to being able to thin down the paints I’ve been using in this case revells Aqua acrylics by almost 50% doubling the pot size of 18ml I’ve been able to cover the boat in a base colour for the same price as a single top end can of spray paint from Halfords, where as a boat this size would easily cost twice that in a single colour.

I’ve still got to do the deck in a separate colour and then I’m going to add some stencilling, and clear coat to finish.

Now cost wise, base coat primer and top coat lacquer are all from spray cans, but colour is all air brush. So savings in cost is marginal, but the upside is that you avoid the problems that come with over spray, runs, build ups & and cracking, orange peel effect etc in the colour coats.

He other advantage I being able to spray in doors with no ill effects from fumes but over spray dose go everywhere fortunately it doesn’t stick to everything so a quick wipe down and your good to go although I would suggest a mask to be on the safe side.

So some photos so far. Enjoy.

Thanks for the update Roadrunner This is now on my Christmas pressy list Although there is one a little bit larger which I will investigate before making the decision

THE Larger one I’m assuming has a reserve tank which fills and uses the compressed air first giving a more steady stream of air. I had looked at getting one like that but decided for the first time buying that it was better to buy cheaper and see what occurs and if it would give decent results before committing to a better one later on, in all honesty this brush set has only given me a couple of issues, none major, first was on the regulator where I was having issues keeping a steady pressure to which the problem was the rubber o ring was pinched in the thread housing, so replacing it fixed the issue, a cheap fix for 99p on eBay which has given me spares. Although I could have replaced the actual regulator for £10 for a branded one. The other is literally a learning curve on how much to thin the paint, I was originally playing with revells aqua semi and gloss paints, watered down with tap water to 30% which was working but would start to run when I sprayed to close ( which now I should have reduced pressure to 15 bar rather than 30) then along with the air brush clogging up in the top due to dry tip... which was an indication of not thinning enough.

Now spraying the paint neat resulted in better results however the brush would clog very frequently.. there are no instructions how to use the paints I chose in and air brush which lead me to a massive trial and error period. What I found was adding 6ml of warm water to the 18ml pot and mixing yealed better results, especially with Matt paints, however further testing I’ve found that adding 6ml of water to an 18ml pot and mix, spray only 2ml of that mix then adding a further 2ml of water to the pot gives u a perfect spraying mix ( also that the tiny pots can’t hold more than 6ml of water to start with, so adding the last 2ml after the first spray yealed an almost prefect spray concisitancy.

There are a vast range of other paints available to spray with some pre thinned for airbrush purpose. But in my case I opted for a paint that I knew regardless of spraying or brush could take a top coat of lacquer with no I’ll effects.

Thanks for your pointers , I have sprayed with cellulose in the past with an air brush using canned air initially then moving on a small compressor, alas that is defunct now hence wanting a new one.

I have had several of the ones on eBay on my watch list but you are right Roadrunner, perhaps go for the cheaper one and see how it goes then move on to a better one later or not as the case may be, so my conclusion is to pass on your eBay link to Santa better to go with one with a recommendation rather than a suck it and see one.

Well boats painted.

Nothing fancy, I’ve left the side a blank slate for my dad to add his own touches, right now I’m in the final stages of lacquer another two coats and it should be good to harden up and take a nice little polish later. (rattle can lacquer, nothing special )

The bow is two tone on purpose not only to help see the boats nose at a bit is distance but also because the rubber tip will be white so it blends in nice.

A good but time consuming result ( smaller boats would be far easier this things huge!)
Enjoy the photos.

RR

Nice result by the looks of it , the compressor is firmly added to my Christmas pressy list , fingers crossed .

Well i can finally update this airbrush post,

My dad finally sent me the almost finished yacht photos,

As you can see the paint (lacquer) has fully cured and now polished back to a very high shine.

All the gubbins and what not installed.

It only leaves the rudder, keel and sails to be installed all of which are done at lake side setup.

Overall I’m very impressed with the outcome and this goes to show that even a cheap airbrush from eBay can give you pretty decent results.

Enjoy the photos.

RR

Upgrades today!

My brother donated me an airbrush compressor and tank...

My brother replaced the compressors auto cutoff switch as he had an issue with it, however this was while the compressor was without a tank...

When he attached the compressor to a new air tank the compressor refused to work...

He put it down to the compressor being pretty much buggered and sent the whole lot to me...

So I have one extra compressor which runs as New, but a tank that refuses to work,

It took me exactly 2 mins to work out that there was nothing wrong with either part, but I fact a simple blockage in the connnector between compressor output and tank input... one 8mm still bit later and blockage removed, I expect it was a sealing solution for the slip pipe to reduce air loss but it clogged the pipe. Now I’ll put it back together and be able to run two air brushes or have my brothers compressor for spare. Either way I have a fully working airbrush with tank upgrade and decent regulator for air flow control.

Best bit all free..

some people have all the luck I wish the fairys  would leave me one,  as all I  get is duff things that are unrepairable well done for quick remedy

I’ve done nothing but royally take the **** out of my brother all afternoon for this simple blunder.
Like I said to him, didn’t the army teach you to check for blockages in pipe work as an engineer?

I will in this case forgive his blunder as he’s recently had his first child so it’s a lot to adjust too however I would put it down to a senior moment but he’s younger than I am, so no excuses!

Has the compressor and tank running on and off for an hour now and no issues, played with the regulator tweaking pressures and his tank can now boost the max pressure I was getting at 30psi up to 58psi of working pressure before the autocutoff shuts it down at 60psi.

I’m pleased to say the new tank runs my brush vastly better, as I’m getting a more consistent air flow, along with no longer having to bleed the air down on the initial few seconds of use before letting paint flow, which has reduced my need to do a few squirts on paper before hitting the model, in also not getting any intital splatter ( which I was catching with paper before I went to the model).

To be fair if I wasn’t given this I wouldn’t have brought a compressor and tank setup until mine died, but knowing how much better the improvements with an additional tank and the regulator swap has made a cheap airbrush kit almost semi pro!

I still can’t fault my original compressor in any form for performance in cash value and some playing you soon work out it’s quirks to achieve good results, the addition of the tank just ups your game.

If your looking to upgrade with a tank addition then I would strong advice it, next I’ll look at some better quality brushes from Badger.

Just a semi final update of my dads yacht which was featured during the air brush review.

I will try to get a photo of it sailing however that’s subject to my dad sailing and taking photos at the same time, my dads a bright man but not overly multitalented when it comes to technology!


However be prepared for sunglasses