Lacquer thinner is pretty strong stuff, and will eat away plastic if you're not careful. Water will dilute these thinners in the paint, but it will not reduce the binders in the Tamiya paint. 2 oz. or do i have to use something else??? Modern Hobbies LLC
(purchased of course in the bulk 50 gallon drum. For hand painting, I thin Testors Enamels with Odorless Mineral Spirits. View our, Tools, Techniques, and Reference Materials. This mixture works very well for Gunze too! There’s no doubt that airbrushing Tamiya acrylic paint is significantly better when using Tamiya lacquer thinner, rather than Tamiya X20-A acrylic thinners. For airbrush use, I thin the paints with Lacquer Thinner. I also thin Tamiya acrylics with Lacquer Thinner. For better paint brushing results use Tamiya Paint Retarder (87114) for a smoother brushstroke free finish. To participate you must either login or register for an account. Isopropyl alcohol will thin most Tamiya paints just fine (their metallic ones need something stronger). The process of refining crude oil to produce gasoline, kerosene and other fuels also yields a number of other products, including solvents. Well, there’s only one thing for it, it’s time to see how they stack up against each other in an acrylic paint airbrushing face-off! Proper ratio for paint thickness differs according to weather conditions. Can i use water to thin out Tamiya's acrylic paints??? It’s important that we use Tamiya’s brand of lacquer thinners as it’s specifically designed to be used on plastic models and the like, and will not eat the plastic away. Getting paint from a spray can into an airbrush or bottle is often damn near impossible, UNLESS you know this ridiculously simple trick... Tamiya’s water based acrylic paint can be thinned with their proprietary X20-A acrylic thinners, iso-propyl alcohol (IPA), distilled water, and I’ve even shown that it can be thinned with regular tap water with outstanding results, but few people seem to realise that it can also be thinned with Tamiya lacquer thinner. To separate these out, refiners boil the crude and pass the vapors through distillation tubes in a procedure known as fractional distillation. I use it as the cleaner of last resort, but don't thin anything but Tamiya primer and Mr. Surfacer with it. . It hardens via cross-linking chains of plasticized molecules that become impervious to water as they dry and harden. Owner/ Manager
Although brushable lacquers are available, most varieties must be sprayed because the solvents in which they are dissolved evaporate quickly. Thinning the thick and extremely viscous acrylic paint even out its consistency and makes it quite akin to that of watercolor or even gouache paint. There’s a chance it’s also the metallic in the silver paint I’m using which, from my research, can make the paint act as if it’s thicker than non-metallic paint… something I’ll put to the test later on as you’ll see. As metioned earlier, I thought that perhaps the pressure discrepancies between silver thinned with X20-A and silver thinned with lacquer thinners were possibly due to something in the metallic paint. But, to get back to the original two questions: Yes, it does tend to sometimes get a bit thicker after the bottle has been opened and yes, Mr Color Leveling thinner is a very good choice for thinning the paint. The primary purpose of lacquer thinner is to think paints that are made with lacquer. Is this a perfect way to do it that will result in exact measurements every time…? You don’t have to do it exactly this way, just get the paint however you’ve done so successfully in the past, don’t stress on how many mist or wet coats you use as everyone will have their own unique approach to it. Using Tamiya Lacquer Thinner will yield faster drying results and a harder finish. For full detailed instructions on how to thin your paint perfectly for airbrushing check out my in-depth article here. Greg Williams
So if a 1:1 thinning ratio needs adjusting to work properly for your conditions and equipment then don’t stress, that’s completely normal. This test will involve taking Tamiya acrylic paint and thinning one portion with Tamiya X20-A acryrlic thinners, and another portion of paint thinned with Tamiya lacquer thinners. Indianapolis, IN. Learn on the expensive, easy-to-use stuff, then once you get a feel for what you like and how to thin for your brush & tastes, get your 4 gallon drums of IPA and go to town. Acrylic paint is a water-based polymer. home made Tamiya thinner for pennies on the dollar! I decant equal parts of alcohol, water and 2 to 3 drops of Liquidex Flow-Aid into a plastic squeeze bottle (available at www.micromark.com). Tamiya X-20A acrylic thinner is the perfect choice to thin Tamiya acrylic paint when spraying through an airbrush or cleaning bristle brushes. For airbrushing, I would use airbrush thinner and perhaps some Vallejo flow enhancer. But I like the paint on the thin side when I'm air brushing. Happy painting! I add about 30-40% alcohol to the paint. I just eyeball it. Most commonly of course I use O.D. I only use lacquer thinners or Mr. model leveling thinners with Tamiya. Note that Tamiya is not a real full, water based acrylic. That being said, you can successfully mix your own, but if you're a beginner with an airbrush, I'd recommend getting the X-20A and not messing with that. To see my airbrushing test experiment of Tamiya acrylic paint thinned with tap water click here. Tamiya X-20A acrylic thinner is the perfect choice to thin Tamiya acrylic paint when spraying through an airbrush or cleaning bristle brushes. . If you haven’t done so already I recommend you give it a try yourself and see what you think, I’m pretty sure you’ll be converted! For the rare times that I will thin a Tamiya paint (I find that it is pretty much a/b ready), I use tap water without any problems. Why don't you just use their thinner so no problems with any finishes. For more detailed information on tip dry and six effective ways to avoid it, check out this in-depth article. I can’t see any significant difference at all between the paints thinned with X20-A and those thinned with lacquer thinners. I don’t want the prior paint and thinners contaminating the next step of the experiment, so a good clean is in order. Please do not apply a lacquer overcoat, as it could damage the acrylic or enamel paint … The formula within the thinner gives Tamiya acrylic paints the right consistency to blend colors without fading or spotting. So… as you can see from the following pictures the overall finish on each spoon was pretty much identical. I’m going to use exactly the same amount of paint and thinners in each part of the airbrushing experiment, and will use a 1:1 ratio of paint to thinners. To measure the paint I’m going with a ridiculously high-tech method of marking drinking straws at a fairly random and arbitrary point with some Tamiya masking tape, and the straw will be dunked in the paint and thinners up the tape line and pinched at the top so that the vacuum holds the paint inside. For a head-to-head comparison of using primer straight from the spray can versus airbrushed primer check out this link, you may be surprised! I use Tamiya and have had very good results thining with an alcohol and water mix. From what I gather, the Tamiya thinner also includes some flow improver and paint retarder, and isn't just IPA + water. Hope this helps, happy modeling! Although the Premium paints are pre thinned, some environmental and personal choices may lead to adjustments of the thinning ratio using this product. To thin I use Tamiya X-20A or Testor Model Master Acryl Thinner #50496, I pay 4.99 for a 118ml bottle, both with great results. Paint retarder might also be useful (already included in the Mr.Color Leveling thinner). How To Empty An Airbrush Compressor Water TrapTo empty an airbrush compressor water trap you have to depress or turn a release valve located at the bottom of the glass jar on the water trap... How To Use A Single Action Airbrush (Step by Step Guide). Testors Thinner is basically Mineral Spirits. I expect that if I thinned the paint even more with X20-A acrylic thinner that I could achieve the same quality of atomisation at the same pressure, but this would be a little wasteful of thinners and would also leave the paint more transparent which isn’t ideal at all. For best results Tamiya acrylic paint should be thinned with Tamiya acrylic thinners to a ratio of approximately 1:1, and airbrushed at the lowest possible air pressure setting that gives proper paint atomisation and coverage. I use an acrylic auto body putty and I found that the lacquer thinner worked well, thinning the putty if the mixture of putty to thinner was monitored and controlled. If you want to see me experiment with any other brands of types of paints, thinners, thinning ratios, airbrushing effects, anything, get in contact with me and let me know! You can see below the X20-A thinned acrylic paint on the left, and the lacquer thinned acrylic paint on the right just after mixing each one. I can’t personally say how well it works simply because I don’t use acrylic medium by itself to thin down my paints. No two thinners are made the same, so if you use a general purpose or automotive thinners to in your model paint you may find that it eats away at the plastic and totally ruins your paint work and your kit. So in order to thin any kind of finish, you need to know what you started with. We do not sell, rent or trade our email lists. Use "acrylic" thinner (Tamiya acrylics aren't true acrylics so they aren't thinable with water) like Tamiya X-20A or just IPA or lacquer thinner like Tamiya Lacquer thinner or Mr.Color Levelling Thinner (keep in mind that lacquers will be smelly though). Example of common Acrylic paints is Tamiya. Interestingly, at a thinning ratio of 1:1 using the X20-A acrylic thinner and an air pressure of 18 psi, the airbrush actually sputtered a little. I don’t recall this being common with Tamiya acrylics and my airbrushing setup, so at the moment I’m putting it down to either the cold whether and the cold paint not atomising properly, it’s maybe 16 degrees Celsius where I’m airbrushing today, not normal for me at all here in Australia. I finally had a chance to test out the lacquer paints today and OMG, the results are fantastic. It may start to dry even sooner, as is common with acrylic paints, and result in a situation called tip dry, which, just like it sounds, is when the tip of your airbrush needle accrues dried paint and ruins the spray pattern to some degree. I have heard of many people using straight acrylic medium to thin down their airbrush paint. I thin as normal: 1:1 drops of paint to lacquer thinner and to the final mix: add a few drops of a mild retarder. I use Tamiya thinner... the larger 250mL bottle is fairly cheep and lasts a very long time. It's water based and not a solvent based acrylic. It works with it for some reason. We’re trying to find out two things with this experiment: ⚠ As with everything in modeling, you will always learn and improve better if you actually do the test yourself rather than just look at it being done, so I highly recommend you grab yourself some plastic desert spoons to experiment on or some old scrap kits parts. I've had really great results using alcohol as an acrylic thinner for paints from Tamiya, Gunze Sangyo (Aqueous/Mr.Hobby), Vallejo, Italeri, and Akan (don't try this with Testors Acryl, it took some time to clean the resulting goo from my airbrush). The OD I thinned a little more. It’s as if the X20-A thinned paint was drying a LOT quicker than the lacquer thinned paint. Fill a spray bottle with paint thinner or lacquer. For Tamiya Surface Primer, your options are off the shelf lacquer thinner, Tamiya's lacquer … If you mix it with lacquer thinner it just clumps up. Coverage and Modulation: To assess how well this paint covers and how well it can be used to modulate the intensity of coverage, I diluted some Mission Models Khaki (#MMP-023) to 60% paint:40% Thinner/PolyMix and sprayed that at ~15psi through a Harder&Steenbeck Evolution with a 0.2mm tip.The subject was my tan primer test sheet complete with simulated pre-shaded lines and ham-handed … Acrylic Lacquer Thinner. i use Tamiya paints a lot too, and i have to agree w/ Merlin -. Tamiya recommends it for use with their new line of lacquer paints. www.naplak.com/modeling ... a free site for modelers
I found this to be true with the Tamiya acrylic paints I use and I … This is a very toxic product so use goggles, respirator and rubber gloves. Tamiya’s water based acrylic paint can be thinned with their proprietary X20-A acrylic thinners, iso-propyl alcohol (IPA), distilled water, and I’ve even shown that it can be thinned with regular tap water with outstanding results, but few people seem to realise that it … , So without further ado let’s dive straight in and get the step-by-step process…. I used Tamiya primer straight from the can, a single mist coat then a single wet coat followed by sanding smooth with 800 grit sandpaper once the primer was dry. I was very keen to see how the lacquer thinned paint airbrushed at 18 psi relative to the X20-A thinned paint, and very interestingly it did not have any of the sputtering or speckling problems I had with the X20-A thinned paint. For Enamel thin with X-20 For Acrylic thin with X-20A Are you using an airbrush? This … It was immediately evident that the paint was atomising perfectly at 18 psi and was going down on the test piece much better than the X20-A thinned paint, even given the pressure differences used! It sprays smoother from the airbrush at about 10-15% lower air pressure, and doesn’t spatter at all like the X20-A thinned paint did at the same pressure. I think I have PE poisioning. I’m not going to strip the airbrush down entirely but I will remove the needle and give it a good clean, as flush out the airbrush and clean out the cup thoroughly as well. Now we’re getting down to business and will take a very close look at exactly how the lacquer thinned paint atomises and sprays, and what the paint finish looks like right after application. You can't thin lacquer with oil or water. I thought it deserved better. What Model Paint Or Airbrushing Experiments Do You Want To See? If I am going to shoot Tamyia paint, I find that most can be shot right from the bottle with no thinning! Can I paint with lacquer spray over a model coated with acrylic or enamel paint? Acrylic paint dries in about 20 minutes and cures in 24 hours. The paint and respective thinners were introduced into the mixing cups using new straws each time, and just for reference the mixing cups are simply small plastic shot glasses bought at the grocery store extremely cheaply, from memory 200 cost me a few dollars. If so, then somewhere around 20-25% thinner usually does the job for me when using a fresh jar. On adding the lacquer thinner to the silver paint I immediately noticed that it seemed to mix in a lot more thoroughly than with the X20-A acrylic thinner. . How I Mix Tamiya Acrylic Paint For Airbrushing 2 parts paint to 1 part thinner mix well and your ready to airbrushIts just that easy Then, no. If the differences from using this method, which won’t be much at all, are enough to throw out the test results, well the test was doomed to failure anyway. While most acrylic paints are water based (water soluble), Tamiya's acrylic paints are cellulose thinner based (alcohol and lacquer thinner). The contents of your paint will define what type of thinner you will use. Vallejo, model master, ak, ammo, citadel all HATE lacquer thinners and will gum up your airbrush. You can thin Tamiya's Acrylic Paints with Lacquer but it does not work the other way around and you cannot thin Lacquer paints with Acrylic thinning solutions. Just to make sure, I did the entire experiment over with the light green…, From this I gather than that’s just how the Tamiya acrylic paint reacts with my airbrushing set up and current cold climate, but regardless the end result is that the Tamiya lacquer thinned paint will atomise perfectly at a lower pressure than the X20-A thinned paint. You will need to choose the appropriate thinner or lacquer to mix with the type of auto paint you will be using. The lacquer thinner will dilute lacquer based-paints. 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'Re not careful... the larger 250mL bottle is fairly cheep and lasts a very long time a chance test. From the spray can versus airbrushed primer check out this in-depth article airbrush thinner and perhaps some flow...