Ive been doing lots of reading regarding your workshop/work area. I’ve also read a lot about AB techniques and how to clean AB’s.
But for those of you who have specific workshops/work areas…where do you clean your airbrush? I mean, say you are inbetween enamel colors, im sure you just run some thinner through your airbrush and then go to the next color…but what about when you are done with the entire AB session…and now you have several glass droppers with paint in them, you have taken apart your AB for its final cleaning… where do you clean the droppers and AB, right there on your work area, or do you go outside, or to a kitchen/bathroom sink etc?
I have some metallic coffee cans for that purpose. I simply run some cleaner thru my airbrush spraying it into the can. If you don’t like the fumes, you can do this under the spraybooth if you have one.
I carefully clean everything out in the kids bathroom downstairs across from my evil laboratory. Eventually, I want a utility sink in the garage to use for that purpose.
I clean them in the front where the paint comes out.
[:-^]
[:D]
Sorry… couldn’t resist.
I do my airbrushing outside for now, so I do the initial “blowout” outside, then bring everything in and clean it all in the kitchen sink. Since I switched to acrylics, it’s actually a quick process, and the only smell associated with it are generally my fault. (Barump-da-bump… thank you folks, I’ll be here all night. Be sure and tip your waitress…)
If I’m cleaning to switch colors- right there on the back porch. When we finally get into our new house and I have a proper model room, I plan on having a handy-dandy spray booth and cleaning station.
Hehehehe… clean it in the front… sometimes I crack me up.
Same with me. I have cotton inside the cans and whenever the cotton becomes saturated, I simply dispose of it. I have a can for each type of cleaner I am using. The lid has a small hole where I place the AB nozzle in it so I don’t get fumes flying around. I usually place the can in my spraybooth when cleaning, if possible. After the final cleaning I replace the lid with one without a hole.
All my work is done inside my booth with the blower on high. No chemicals comes into the booth open and no chemicals leave the booth open.
Pour left over paint into a storage jar. 2) Set compessor to 60 lbs/p.s.i. 3) Fill cup half full with used lacquer thinner and scrub gently with old paint brush. ( I finally found a use for those white Testors paint brushes!) 4) Spray a little into the booth and dump the rest into the used thinner jar. 5) Wipe out cup with a paper towel. 6) Fill cup half full with clean thinner,scrub cup again and spray all this into the booth. 7) Fill cup half full with clean thinner and spray all this into booth. 8) Hang up airbrush and set compressor to 0 psi. 9) Leave booth fan on until filter is dry and all VOC are gone. (Takes about 5 minutes with lacquer thinner). This my seem to be a long process, but it only takes about two minutes. The high p.s.i and booth fan does most of the work.
Using this method, I only have to break my airbrush down once every three months to lube the needle and trigger.