acyrlics not mixing

Tools, Techniques, and Reference Materials Painting and airbrushing
1

long story short, Testors Acrylic Clear Coat, Games Workshop Acyrlic, and Badger Acrylic Air-Opaque dont mix.

The Testors removes the Games Workshop paint if you paint “hard” but it loosens the paint.

Games Workshop paint mixes with fully dry Badger Air Opaque into an ugly goo.

The Testors clear coat mixes with the Badger Air Opaque to make colored clear flat.

What is wrong? By the way the Air Opaque was (and must be) sprayed on and i applied the Games Workshop paints and the Clear coat with hand brushing. Also, all of my paints are acrylic so why cant they mix?

2

Acrylic paint are not compatible between brands. As a general rule try not to mix different brands of acrylic paints.

3

I am actually not MIXING them per say, I am applying them seperately with suffient time to dry.

do you know if Gunze Sanyo Mr. Topcoat harms acrylics?

4

According to the statement about the Badger air-opaque colors:
"They are suitable for use on illustration board, photo materials, acetate, and all papers. " They are entirely water-based in an acrylic copolymer. Sounds like the Badger paint is not much more than an acrylic watercolor–not good for models. In addition, the Games Workshop Acrylics also sound a bit like watercolors. It appears that by spraying one onto another, you are essentially re-constituting the paint into its original liquid form. According to one website, the Games Workshop acrylics have been successfully used as an undercoat on figures prior to spraying on an enamel topcoat–but then organic solvents shouldn’t attack water-soluble pigments.
You didn’t specify what you are working on, but I would submit that using acrylics designed for modeling (Testors, Gunze, Tamiya, etc.) should be used exclusively for that purpose, or at least just use one manufacturer’s paints for a project.

I’m not sure, but it appears that Mr. Topcoat may be a lacquer. Since lacquers, like enamels, aren’t water soluble, it’s very possible that Mr. Topcoat could be used successfully over acrylics, provided they’ve had sufficient drying time; however, I would shoot some test panels before trying it on your pride and joy. To draw a comparison, I’ve used Testor’s Dullcote (a lacquer) successfully over Tamiya acrylics.

Hope this helps.
Gip Winecoff

5

thanks for the advice. I will attempt to topcoat a spare model with Mr. Topcoat.

The Games Workshop paints are not watercolor. The reason the paint lifted off a few small areas was because the paint didnt have a good grip (didnt wash or prime the model-oops)

so my problem lies with the Badger paints!

6

Just my [2c] but you might consider experimenting with a coat of “Future” in between applications to act as a buffer.