Hi, I was at the last steps to put a wash over my new build Hellcat, then somehow the paint go off when I was using the cotton swab to clean the excess wash. Does anyone know where did I go wrong? I used enamel wash acrylic paint as told and this is the first time I tried. The result was unexpected and discourage.
Ok, a few questions for you…
- What brand of acrylic paint are you using?
- How long did you leave the paint to cure before applying your wash?
- What did you use to thin your wash?
Under normal circumstances, an enamel paint thinned with a thinner such as mineral spirits shouldn’t affect acrylic paint (assuming that the acrylic has had sufficient time to cure.
But right now, we need a little more information to find the cause of your problems.
Hi Phil_H,
I used Tamiya acrylic and I left the paint to be cured for around 6 hour some area for a night. I used Universal enamel thinner from Testor for the wash. I’m thinking because I did not use primer so the paint not really stick well to the surface.
Ok, my first suspect would be insufficient curing time. Though they can appear dry in minutes, I’d recommend at least overnight (min 12 hours) for Tamiya flat acrylics. If using Tamiya gloss acrylics, I would push this out to a week to 10 days. I’m not joking about the week-10 days for gloss, it really does take that long to cure.
I haven’t used Testors Universal thinner, so I’m not at all familiar with how it behaves, but looking at the MSDS info, it contains 20-25^ of “n-Propoxy Propanol” which sounds to me like an alcohol. I’m not sure if this may have an effect on Tamiya’s acrylics, but they are soluble in various alcohols.
I do know that when fully cured, Tamiya acrylics are resistant to Mineral Spirits so you may wish to consider using Mineral Spirits as an alternative thinner for your wash.
I must be the drying time.
Yep, bet it’s the drying time for the acrylics.
That’s weird cuz I have sprayed Tamiya Acrylics and within 30 minutes tried to clean up some overspray over enamel and it was VERY difficult for the acrylic to come off even using Tamiya thinner and Windex. Tamiya paints seem to be very well made and very strong. I wonder if this “Universal” thinner is lacquer based which will eat thru both enamels and acrylics. I make my own washes from Artist Oils and Turpentine from Home Depot and have never had a problem.
Should be dry enough now, the original post was 3 years ago…[;)]
tee hee!
Darn!! didn’t see the original posting date! 
Well ya helped anyway- thats what counts. 