Hi
Whats the difference between cleaning a Airbrush with a thinner and Tamiyas Airbrush cleaner? Which should I do?
Thank you
Quick answer: use a cleaner to clean your airbrush. I’ve not used the Tamiya AB cleaner, so I can’t vouch for its effectiveness.
In theory, the airbrush cleaner is formulated to break down a wide variety of stuff, including paint. Thinner, on the other hand, is not meant to break down the paint is designed for. Its purpose is to dillute the paint, not destroy it.
Thus, if you have some dried paint in your airbrush, thinner may not dissolve it readily.
Which you should use depends on the paint. For Tamiya acrylics, I clean with windex (Badger says it’s OK to do that for their AB) or hardware store lacquer thinner.
An interesting post. First, for any of my airbrushes I use DuPont lacquer thinner, for AB cleaning following any paint product use. If anything seems a bit too stubborn, then Acetone.
I do take extra care to avoid anything getting into the back of the body, especially the air valve. No known adverse affects in decades of the practice.
But this post leads me to wonder, does the branded airbrush cleaner have ingredients that would have beneficial effects on such as teflon, rubber or whatever other seal/bearing components are in place? I’m sure harsh cleaners might be tough on some components.
Might be a good idea to do a last rinse spray using AB cleaner, following other cleaners used first. I’ll try it.
Thanks for the post.
Patrick