Very impressive Greg, thanks again.
Is denatured alcohol the same as ethyl rubbing alcohol?
No, absolutely not. Denatured alcohol, these days, is usually methyl alcohol. Sometimes ethyl alcohol with a methyl alcohol additive. Ethyl is much safer and just as effective.
Actually here is the skinny on Denatured alcohol:
Denatured alcohol is ethanol with added adulterants that make it useless for consumption as an intoxicating beverage by rendering it toxic or extremely distasteful to drink, but still useful for industrial processes or as a household chemical.
So it is different from both Isopropyl alcohol and ethyl alcohol?
Those are the two types I have here.
Here is a link to the MSDS for Methyl Alcohol. Note especially the following:
Route of Entry: Skin…YES
Route of Entry: Ingestion…YES
Route of Entry: Inhalation…YES
Health Hazards - Acute and Chronic…
[INGEST] EVEN SMALL AMOUNTS MAY CAUSE BLINDNESS OR DEATH.[INHALE] IRRITATE MUCOUS MEMBRANES
[EYE] VAPOR/LIQUID CAUSES IRRITATION, TEARING AND BURNING.[SKIN] MAY BE ABSORBED THROUGH THE SKIN IN TOXIC OR LETHAL AMOUNTS.
[CHRONIC] MAY CAUSE SYSTEMIC POISONING, BRAIN DISORDERS, IMPAIRED VISION AND BLINDNESS. INHALATION MAY WORSEN CONDITIONS OF EMPHYSEMA OR BRONCHITIS. REPEATED SKIN CONTACT MAY CAUSE DERMAL IRRITATION, DRYNESS AND CRACKING.
Methyl alcohol will also attack some plastics and synthetic rubbers more aggressively than ethyl.
You have to be over legal drinking age to purchase ethyl alcohol. Because you can drink it (NOT recommended—high concentrations will dessicate your tongue, very painful.), it is also safer to use.
Parents, keep the main bottle in the liquor cabinet, and add some quinine or bitters, or even vanilla extract to the hobby room bottle to make it unpalatable.
It is further restricted in some areas because it can be used as a reagent in the manufacture of illegal drugs. Purchase in small quantities or you may attract the attention of local law enforcement, and they don’t need the red herring.
Yes, and they are all you need. See my previous post.
Thanks Ross.
I miss Gip posting here with his knowledge of this area.
Where ya at Gip? [;)]
Hey Greg,
How do you mix Tamiya paints to come up with a color like RAF Dark Green and RAF Medium Sea Grey? I didn’t see these colors listed on that site with the mixing ratios for FS numbers.
For all of those who were asking for the conversion chart, it is here:
There’s two tabs at the botom of the page, the one to the right gives a simpler view of normal names, and their vallejo equivalent. (The regular names are to the left, look it up and scroll over all the way to the right for the Vallejo equiv)
Darson from here on FSM was kind enough to come up with this, so any thanks (or complaints [;)]) should go to him.
If you are on dial up it would be worth your while to click on the link, wait while it downloads and print it… or if using IE right click, add to favorites, then go to the icon for the page and right click the icon, then click “Make Available offline” fom the menu, which will save it to your hard drive so you don’t have to download it everytime.
For RAF Dark Green, (approx. FS34079) try XF-61.
For the RAF Medium Sea Gray, (approx. FS36270), try XF-53.
*These are the closest matches without mixing.
*For dead on accuracy, I usually keep “Testors Technical Manual” closeby with their color charts and compare them side-by side. If I need to adjust, I dab a drop of each Tamiya on plain white paper next to the color I need. I then lighten or darken the Tamiya colors with white or black. The variations are so close, usually this isn’t nessessary.
A heap of thanks to Darson!!! [^][yeah][wow]
And to you for posting it here! [^]
Ross- I mainly was using it for Vallejo till (DOH!) it hit me it cross references everything!!! Even gives the colors used in the Tamiya line, if not the exact ratio for the mix… A very handy guide from a very talented person!
Eliott - I forgot to reply to this earlier… .I’m not the acrylic master, I just play one on TV… haha… Actually I am kinda stuck with them (thanks to something I picked up in the Middle East in 1990, it caused severe asthma that still pops its head up now and then) so I make the best and find every angle I can… after using Vallejo (et al) I no longer look on them as something to get around, but as what I prefer to paint with…
Ditto[#ditto]
Do you think Tamiya’s range of paints is really limited? Just wondering because I was using MM enamels but mainly doing aircraft. Then when I started devoting most of my time to armor I switched over to Tamiya acrylics. I’ve never had the occasion to airbrush cars, sci-fi etc… and you know how most armor colors run in a basic range. I just haven’t run into a situation where I was mixing much unless it was for weathering or I wanted a specific tint of a color.
I use Tamiya X20 to clean my AB and so far no problems. I mean I haven’t noticed that its any more work to clean my AB with acrylics vs. MM enamels. The funny thing is that one of the things I expected when I switched to acrylics is that the fumes wouldn’t be as bad. But X20 is about as wicked smelling as anything I’ve ever used. I just wasn’t expecting it to be that bad.
They do not use the FS numbers on their paints like MM does, and that is what I meant.
I wouldn’t spend the extra money on a cleaner like that when many household products clean just as well for much less money.
Try mixing 1 part Simple Green cleaner, 1 part Windex with 2 parts filtered or distilled water and see how that does for you. It cleans most acrylics very well.
Greg,
I was just looking at the charts at http://www.ipmsstockholm.org/colorcharts/stuff_eng_colorcharts_fs.htm and noticed an error.
They list FS36270 as Neutral Gray as well as RAF Ocean Gray.
They also recommend Tamiya XF-53 for Neutral Gray although XF-53 is much too dark. [%-)]
Are you using X-20 or X-20A? X-20 is an enamel thinner, whereas X-20A is the acrylic thinner. If you are using the enamel thinner, that may explain things.
I was following this thread and noticed that Greg referenced a Tamiya paint mixing chart on the IPMS-Stockholm site. I went there but could not find the Tamiya mixing chart. Anybody have the link to that specific chart. With all the great things said about Tamiya, I may give them a try. But you know my luck with acrylics…
E
Here’s the link : http://www.ipmsstockholm.org/colorcharts/stuff_eng_colorcharts_fs.htm