Tamiya acrylic/ laquer thinner test

Tools, Techniques, and Reference Materials Painting and airbrushing
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After reading the various posts on the subject at Hyperscale, having tried Tamiya’s house thinner, 91% and 70% alcohol, distilled water, and Windex with mixed results- I tried modeler, Tony Bell’s method of thining Tamiya Acrylic with laquer thinner. In a word, WOW! Not only did it work, I was able to sustain the finest, softest atomized fine lines to date using this paint. In testing Tony Bell’s method, I prepaired the paint by stiring it in-bottle slowly and thouroghly. Next, I dispensed the paint into a empty fim canister adding the laquer thinner at a ratio of roughly 1:1 and stirred the mix thouroughly. When stirring, I noticed that the laquer thinner blended the paint emmediately with no separation of of the pigment or vehicle, not did it gum-up, or dry-up in the film canister. I put the mix to the test, loading it into my Iwata HP-C airbrush with it’s tiny .3mm nozzle/needle- surely if sprayed through this airbrush, I would be sold. I dropped the air pressure to approx. 12 psi and began to spray tiny fine lines, to my amazement that were extremely well atomized-compairable to MM enamels! Still suspicious, I waited to see if the mix would begin to clog, spit, separate, gum-up, or whatever else. Shockingly yet, it never did, it stayed thouroughly mixed as I continued to spray for 5-7 minutes. I then set the airbrush down with the paint sitting in the airbrush to see if it would dry up, or clog the tip. Nope!, I pulled back on the trigger and I resummed spraying!
After spraying, I checked the integrity of the paint film. I was surprised that the paint (Dark Grey, XF-24) covered very well over dark colors (flat black, dark green, gunship grey, etc.) and it was tough and dried fast. The paint film had a smooth, slightly satin appearance with no suspected graininess, dry spots, fish eyes or orange peel. I then rolled up my sleaves and grabbed the masking tape for the final test. After 10 minutes or so after spraying, I layed regular and blue painters masking tapes over the painted areas, burnishing it down with my fingers. Abruptly and quickly, I pulled the tape from the painted area and…nothing came off!, cool! Now excited and grining from ear to ear, I finished up by cleaning my airbrush with the laquer thinner as normal. I am shocked and amazed at this test using Tony’s method…why didn’t I try this 10 years ago!!! It works guys…man does it work. The only con, and It’s a BIG one: this method negates the “clean-up with water, no harsh chemicals” notion of acrylics. I don’t know if others have tried this before with any sucess, but man…do I have a new appreciation for this paint. Doing more tests…I’ll report back later.

Comments and thoughts on this are encouraged, what do you guys (and gals) think?

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Hmm, interesting. I’m anxious to hear more about this Greg.

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Tamiya Acrylics… with the x’s before the numbers??? Tamiya acrylics??? really??? Laq. thinner big smile
Dude I am about to ab my big hog I been putting blood sweat and tears into and worrying about the acrylic overall sea blue. I am not particully found of acrylics, but my wifes sensitive body cant handle to many of the Laq fumes. When cleaning that test after words… did you use any more or less Laq. to get the brush clean. I tend to over due it in my cleaning and this is intersting to me as imho Tamiya makes a dead on seablue straight outta the bottle.
Anything else come outta that test?
Jeff

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I just tried this method for the first time today and I must say Im exceedingly happy with the results. I to now have a new found appreciation for Tamiya paint and will be using it as much as possible. I am just thrilled with the results.

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Like you said, the big drawback is the fumes, the main reason I switched to Acrylic. I still use Alclad II, but everything else is Acryl. Spraying enamel in general I find is much easier and finer than Acryl, do you find that this combo is better or equvalent to enamel? Because if I’m going to put up with the fumes anyway, might as well go with what works better. Thanks for the input.

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Wow, that’s really cool. I have to rry that. I do usually work with enamels though.

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Out of curiosity, which brand of lacquer thinner did you use, who is the manufacturer, and is there a part or catalog number associated with the product?

Thanks
Gip Winecoff

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Doesn’t using lacquer thinner for acrylics kind of defeat the purpose of buying acrylics in the first place? [%-)]

Mike

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Styrene i used klean strip lacquer thinner part # Q17014 purchased at my local walmart and it is proudly made in the good ol USA.

Mikev of course thinning with lacquer does defeat the purpose of acrylic but as with most modelers I seem to over engineer things. But on a more usefull note I have had random luck getting a finish that I like with acrylic from either MM or Tamiya I know this is my lack of skill rather then the paint or my AB (I have only but 9 mos of AB experience). So to make a long story short I have a bunch of acrylic paint that would be unused and wasted. The ends justify the means I suppose and if I can use up the paint and still get a good finish then Im happy.

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9X19mm, Tamiya Acrylic thinned correctly with thier own thinner (X20A) will give you one of the best finishes available of any model paints. Have you tried spraying with Tamiya’s own thinner? [tup]

Cheers…Snowy

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I tried it yesterday and I am stunned, speechless as to the finish I got on my 1/32 corsair. Having also used the tamiya thinner (this for snowy), I say I have at least half again better finish with Lacq. thinner. I used #w5700 for the thinner Styrene. I thinned Tamiya Acrylic XF-17 Sea Blue cut 50/50 with the afore mentioned Lacq. Thinner and sprayed it at 10-12 psi with my 360. Follow Plasticmod’s advice very closely because the careful stirring is very important.
Clean up was cool too as I found I needed very very little thinner to clean it with (including backflushing), so while the usual stinky fumes where there it was not as bad as usual. STill experience minor tip dry but the crust was uniform and easy to scrape off.

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Snowy yes I have tried and only used Tamiya thinner until so recently…

Woodbeck3 Im glad you had the same reults and feelings as I had, I was begining to wonder if it was just me.

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Well the results you guys are posting sound really promising, I wonder would it be possible to still clean the airbrush with alcohol and Windex? At least that would minimise the use of Lacquer thinner. Funny thing is I noticed for the first time at the LHS they had 250ml jugs of “Tamiya Lacquer Thinner” (Never seen this before) which I thought odd as the only paints they have which would require thinning are thier acrylic range and thier enamel range, both of which have thier own special thinners. Maybe they have cottoned on to the improved results people are reporting by using Lacquer thinner with thier paint and are cashing in. On another note people, should be aware that unless thier airbrush has packing seals which are impervious to lacquer thinner then they shouldn’t try this or they will damage the seals. For example, I don’t think my HP-CS is set up with seals to handle Lacquer but I believe my HP-CR Revolution is OK to go as it has teflon seals from the factory (Someone please correct me if I’m wrong). Just thought it might be usefull to mention this as some people may ruin thier airbrush by trying this out. [:)]

Cheers…Snowy

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Snowy I just finished painting and I verified that clean up is easily done with alcohol and windex. Hope this is of use.

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Snowy, I inquired about the seals and so forth for my Iwatas too, and what I found out after talking to a Coast Airbrush representative was that the HP-C and CS are fine for spraying Laquers. The caution they raised was that if you want to use “Hot” automotive-type urathanes a teflon needle bearings are a must. FYI, I have used Laquers with no problems at all in all on my Iwatas. Rest assured my good man!

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Greg, rgr that mate. Thanks for the info. [:)]

Cheers…Snowy

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I’m just starting to paint my huge Dragon German Railway gun (Leopold) (36 inches lng!) and want to use the Tamiya acrylic gray that I have…I have just purchased (before I saw the postings here on lacquer thinner) a can of denatured alcohol…Can I use the denatured alcohol with Tamiya’s acrylic as a thinner…and what proportion, please…

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I’m interested in hearing that regular lacquer thinner mixes well with Tamiya acrylics. I did not find that to be the case. However, I have found that Tamiya paints thin beautifully with Gunze Mr. Color acrylic lacquer thinner. I use this combination for all fine detailing with My Iwata HPb. Works like a charm. Had to special order the stuff, but it was worth the time and cost.

Lee

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Can I use denatured alcohol to thin Tamiya acrilics…and what proportion would be best.?..can’t start painting until one of you lads fills me in!

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Billbarber, yep you can use denatured alcohol. I usually go with about 1:1 to thin Tamiya for airbrushing and go from there. I would recommend you use Tamiya’s own thinner for best results though, (Which by all accounts is alcohol with some retarder or flow aid mixed in) as it seems to help with tip dry and the paint seems to level a little better. It does work out a little more expensive but if you buy one of the larger containers and use it just for thinning it will last a long, long time and I can guarantee you will have less problems.

Cheers…Snowy.