… exactly what do you thin the following paints with? And/or anything else you can thing of?
This is for a project im working on.
IE:
Tamiya acrylics thins with what?
Testors Enamels thin with what?
Testors acrylics thin with what?
Boyd enamels thin with what?
Gunze Sangyo (spelling)? thins with what
Aqueous hobby colors (spelling again)? Thins with what
ANd what are the best Named branned thinners for the above?
Thanks all
Pat
The “Best” thinner for any particular paint is probably the thinner that the manufacturer recommends. That said …
Tamiya Acrylics: 91% Isopropyl alcohol with retarder, however this causes all of them to dry flat. To prevent this from happening use Tamiya brand thinner.
Model Master acrylics: 91% Isopropyl alcohol with retarder
Poly Scale Acrylics: Distilled water when necessary (it seldom is) per the instructions on the bottle
Model Master Enamels: Mineral spirits (but I don’t use much enamel at all)
Note that using alcohol for an acrylic thinner causes them to dry even faster than normal. To offset that I use an acrylic retarder with the alcohol. I prefer to use alcohol since I feel that it helps to remove any grease or oil that I may have missed when cleaning the parts.
and thank you too
I agree with Scott; just a couple additional comments:
91% isopropyl should work well, but you should be able to get excellent thinning from plain 70% Isopropyl, which is the concentration of plain ol’ rubbing alcohol that you can find in a drug store.
If you are thinning with straight water, distilled or otherwise, you might consider adding a SMALL drop of dishwashing detergent to your mix. This will help break down the surface tension of the water (the tendency water has to bead up, and not flow)–it essentially makes the water “wetter”.
Mineral spirits work great as a thinner for all enamels. If you are going to airbrush your enamels, I would recommend Testor’s airbrush thinner for their enamels. The stuff is a little “hotter”, and seems to go on the model just a wee bit better.
Another thinner that some folks use for their acrylics is windshield washer fluid. It contains methanol instead of isopropanol, but according to the folks that use it, it works quite well.
Bottom Line: Experiment. Try different things until you find what works best for you.
Remember: Acrylics thin with water and water soluble solvents like alcohols.
Enamels thin with non-water soluble solvents, and are mostly refined petroleum based materials (petroleum hydrocarbons). Mineral spirits and lacquer thinner type materials work best.
Hope this helps a little.
Gip Winecoff