What is a good thinner for airbrushing Tamiya Color acrylic paint? What is a good thinning ratio to use?
Hi Chuck
As well as being a modeller, I am also a Coatings Chemist. You can use the Tamiya X-20A thinner which is a mixture of Isopropanol & a glycol ether solvent (the glycol ether slows down the evaporation rate of the Isopropanol). I use Isopropanol on its own, mixing two parts paint to one part thinner.
Tamiya acrylic paint does not brush well, even when thinned!
Chuck
I use the Tamiya X-20A thinner in a 50/50 mix. I know people use different thinners but I always like to stick with one that the paint manufacturer makes, it saves problems all round I think
Phil
i always use the acrylic thinner for the paint brand. it’s just one less variable to mess with and lasts a while. as for thinning i can’t help much. i put 8-10 drops per pipette tube (not filling the bulb) so the ratio is whatever, then the multi color JGPZ-V gets hit to see how the paint does and if it looks right onto the model which is primed.
every new jar of tamiya gets 3 drops of dishwashing soap and a green dot so i know. helps some but it’s one stoke and wait until it dries as you will pull off paint otherwise. i am leaning more and more to MMA and not getting super anal about the color.
I have better results with 91% Isopropol alcohol than the 70% formula.
I never use Acrylic, stick to enamels with thinner mix.
I use Tamiya’s X-20A to airbrush their paints, never had luck with hardware store thinner. When I airbrush I thin down the paint till its as thin as 2% milk.
I seem to get a less grainy finish using tamiya lacquer thinner than x20a. I have also had good results using isopropyl alcohol into which I mix some tamiya acrylic retarder.
Amen to that brother! I cannot get the hair thin lines with Acrylics as I do with enamels. But back to the question, Tamiya thinner works best.
Wow, talk about a thread bump! [:D]
After some experimentation, I’ve hit upon using Tamiya’s proprietary acrylic thinner, with Tamiya’s acrylics, for airbrushing or for hand-brushing. I tried using isopropyl, but I get my best and most consistent results using Tamiya’s thinner.
I’ve used Tamiya acrylics, along with other maker’s acrylics and enamels, for many years, painting metal figures. And I always had bad results with Tamiya acrylics, brushing by hand. The paint would dry and clump. I learned to thin my acrylics when hand-brushing, and that led me to thinning Tamiya.
I have read of using lacquer thinner when airbrushing Tamiya acrylics, and I want to try it, but haven’t yet.
me too. doesn’t cost that much more and one less variable to deal with. i thin it about half and half, certainly more than MMA and have a joseph jagdpanther i try it on first before my model,
2 drops tamiya lq thinner - the rest X-20A
This will run through the airbrush fine .low P.S.I 19.–20 max.