Iwata HP-CS (or maybe Grex?) + AirBrushDepot Compressor for a newb?

Ebola

I read your post and your setup looks about how I envisioned a proper setup should look, but I'm curious as to why you say it's unnecessary?  What about it makes it unnecessay/pointless? Do the twin pistons inherently eliminate pulsations?  What about for most single piston compressors like the Smart Jet Pro or the Grex?  Would you recommend a tanked single piston or a twin piston?  What about the 5 gallon makes it too big?  Is it that it would take too long to fill, or that it holds more air than is necessary for a long painting session @ the kind of psi a gravity fed brush uses or overworking the compressor or is there something else going on that I'm missing...?

The DA400 compressor is pulsation free to begin with. You can find a review of it in the FSM July 2008 issue on compressor roundup where the DA400 had the highest sustained pressure among all compressors tested. The DA400 has auto on-off so that the motor runs only when I blow air and is quiet when I stop the air. It helps to reduce the tear and wear of the pistons. The DA400 can pump up to 93 psi with no air flow and can sustain pulsation free pressure at 55 psi when I had the Iwata HP-CS full blast. After I add the one-gallon tank, it took just over 1 minute to fill the tank. The motor now has longer duty cycle (off and then on), but I detect no difference in the airflow since it was pulsation free to begin with. I expect most twin piston airbrush compressor to have similar performance when new. But different brand may have different quality control and may differ in the long run.

The compressor cylinder head get only barely warm to the hand filling the one-gallon tank. The auto on-off keeps the heads cool. If I force the motor to run over 5 minutes, the cylinder head will start getting hot to the touch. The small airbrush compressor supplies only 25 litres per minutes (about 1.3 cfm). A larger 5-gallon tank will take more than 5 minutes to fill and thus making the compressor to run hot. You may have a longer time for the cylinder to cool off, but it will get hot again refilling. It is not desirable for the compressor. You need to pair a more powerful compressor with the larger tank, such as the Silentaire Sil-Air 50 series.

I'm going to check out hobby lobby for the sparmax.  Where do I find the 40% coupon, is it online?

HL coupon. They do NOT have 40% for everything coupon every week. Check next week again if you do not see it now. If they are out of stock, the manager can special order any item on their stock list and still honor the coupon.

Cheers for all the help guys, I'm really happy my google hunts for compressor info led me here, really nice community here =D

Did you try the ARC forum?  You will find their tools section answer many of your questions too.

I read your post and your setup looks about how I envisioned a proper setup should look, but I'm curious as to why you say it's unnecessary?  What about it makes it unnecessay/pointless? Do the twin pistons inherently eliminate pulsations?  What about for most single piston compressors like the Smart Jet Pro or the Grex?  Would you recommend a tanked single piston or a twin piston?  What about the 5 gallon makes it too big?  Is it that it would take too long to fill, or that it holds more air than is necessary for a long painting session @ the kind of psi a gravity fed brush uses or overworking the compressor or is there something else going on that I'm missing...?

I'm going to check out hobby lobby for the sparmax.  Where do I find the 40% coupon, is it online?

Cheers for all the help guys, I'm really happy my google hunts for compressor info led me here, really nice community here =D

Ebola

On a twin piston compressor what good does a tank do?  What about a 5 gallon tank?

If you get a good twin piston, the tank has very little effect on performance. See my post here. 5-gallon tank is too big for these type of small compressor. A 0.5-1 gallon tank is a better fit.

If you have a Hobby Lobby nearby, consider the Sparmax TC-2000. The price and availability may be a bit off.

On a twin piston compressor what good does a tank do?  What about a 5 gallon tank?

Yeah, it was Dave that I spoke with.  Definitely pro-Iwata, said I should get a micron and power jet lite for my setup and I really wish I could but it's just cost prohibitive at this time.  I didn't get the impression that he was an Iwata fan boy, just that it's a solid quality product that's top of the line.  Kinda like BMW/Lexus/etc, none of the luxury marques are going to be inferior products, a lot of it seems to come down to personal preference although there are some distinguishing facts, like consistency of quality, availability of spares, and market presence and # of models which in a way makes it more likely (if you find the right model) that you'll get the one that's best suited for your application.  You wouldn't want an M3 if you're a realtor driving clients around and you wouldn't want an RX350 if you're tearing up Nurburg.

As far as compressors, I found a guy who's willing to buy my tanked central pneumatic compressor along with the airbrush that came with it so I'll make most of my money back off of it.  Now I just need to figure out if I want to go with the Scorpion II, polar bear 2000, the grex compressor, the paasche twin piston, or the front runner, the tc-196 or whatever that tcp airbrushes sells, the cheap chinese/taiwanese compressor that's twin cylinder with a tank...  Any suggestions guys?

I can only reiterate what MikeV already told you - Ken at Badger is a class act.  Regardless of what one might think of their airbrushes (and I know some people don' t like them - I happen to not be one of them, I use a Badger 150 and love it) you cannot deny the quality of customer service that they offer.  If you are sold on Badger, I'd say you made a good decision and you are buying a product that will be useful to you and supported by some great people.

Ebola

Then I got an email back from Ken @ Badger who I think is the CEO or boss or something?  In all honesty this was the response I was least anticipating and was only really asking out of thoroughness, I'd kind of already dismissed badger for a few reasons.  I was extraordinarily surprised by his response.  He was the first of the companies to address the other brushes besides the, "well, they're all fine products," response.  He made the point that none of the other brushes I'd been considering would work better than the badger, and that in fact the badger renegade would provide the precision, detail and control I need for miniatures.  He also highly recommended the Vallejo paints I have which was reassuring since I'd bought a bunch of the game color line off of ebay already.

Also, unlike the other companies he provided concrete reasons other than, "we have a fine product with good quality and other people love our product" spiel I got from everyone excepting Grex.  Specifically, the trigger, the nozzle, weight balanced, and the quality/manufacturing tolerances.  One of the biggest things and something he touched upon as well is that they provide top of the line performance and features for a lower price.  Definitely a plus for me.  He also offered to help me locate a quality vendor if need be and provided an email he received from someone who does the same kind of work that I'm looking to do.  As that person said, very much a class act.

Ken is a great guy and one of the most knowledgeable airbrush experts in the world. I know him personally and he is the real deal. Glad you got to speak to him about it.

As a side note, I spent an hour or so talking airbrushes and compressors with Dan from Coast Airbrush and he is a class act and a real font of knowledge and he too recommends the Badger Renegade for the kind of work I'm going to be doing.

Did you mean Dave at Coast Airbrush? Dave Monnig knows his stuff as well but he is very pro Iwata.

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So I went through all of the major airbrush manufacturers and bluntly asked them why I should pick their airbrush in a very long winded email because at that time I was just completely befuddled and didn't even really understand airbrushing so well. 

I talked with Grex first, almost immediately I should add, (very awesome people, someone from there called me back due to the length of the email) and the guy who I talked to (sorry but I don't remember his name) helped educate me on the basics of airbrushing and compressors.  He really didn't have much to say about the competition which, while very politic, wasn't so helpful.  Given that I'm going to be painting miniature figures and Flames of War tanks and such he recommended a different Grex, I think the XN?  It's the one with the smaller needle and nozzle with the smaller gravity fed cup.  He also recommended, no surprise, the grex air compressor.  It's a single piston compressor but he said that pulsing shouldn't be a problem because it can run at a high pressure or something which keeps pulsation from happening despite it having no tank and no second piston.  I'm not sure how much I believe this looking back but what he said did make sense.  Something to do with the hp maybe...?

The next people to get back to me was Joanna from iwata who sent me an email talking very generically but reinforcing that Iwata makes products of the highest quality.  She brought up the point that I should look for a compressor based on how much I'm going to be using it.  For just hobby use she recommended one of the Iwata studio series compressors such as the smart jet or smart jet pro.  Found it interesting that she didn't recommend any of the compressors beneath the smart jet.  Still not sure what the difference is between the smart jet and the smart jet pro is...

Then Harder and Stenbach (sp?) got back to me.  They have a very attractive product, and they ran me through the features.  They just didn't have a whole lot to say and like everyone else so far were very politic and didn't have anything bad to say about the other companies.

Then I got an email back from Ken @ Badger who I think is the CEO or boss or something?  In all honesty this was the response I was least anticipating and was only really asking out of thoroughness, I'd kind of already dismissed badger for a few reasons.  I was extraordinarily surprised by his response.  He was the first of the companies to address the other brushes besides the, "well, they're all fine products," response.  He made the point that none of the other brushes I'd been considering would work better than the badger, and that in fact the badger renegade would provide the precision, detail and control I need for miniatures.  He also highly recommended the Vallejo paints I have which was reassuring since I'd bought a bunch of the game color line off of ebay already.

Also, unlike the other companies he provided concrete reasons other than, "we have a fine product with good quality and other people love our product" spiel I got from everyone excepting Grex.  Specifically, the trigger, the nozzle, weight balanced, and the quality/manufacturing tolerances.  One of the biggest things and something he touched upon as well is that they provide top of the line performance and features for a lower price.  Definitely a plus for me.  He also offered to help me locate a quality vendor if need be and provided an email he received from someone who does the same kind of work that I'm looking to do.  As that person said, very much a class act.

So I'm definitely sold on the Badger Renegade R1V-Velocity, their gravity fed .21mm tip.  Now I just need to find a compressor that fits my budget.  I've heard extraordinarily good things about the Power Jet Pro lite.

As a side note, I spent an hour or so talking airbrushes and compressors with Dan from Coast Airbrush and he is a class act and a real font of knowledge and he too recommends the Badger Renegade for the kind of work I'm going to be doing.

Ebola,  sorry to be tardy jumping in here, but I haven't been here since Nationals.  I don't paint a  lot of figures, but I bought a Badger Renegade Velocity at Nationals and since I have painted about a dozen small figures (actually small farm animals for my sons school diorama), and I can honestly say this airbrush is the best thing I have ever used for airbrushing such fine detail.  I know it's actually an automitive detail airbrush, but man is it nice for real intricate stuff like figure pieces.  Anyhow, just sharing my seemingly relevant to your thread opinion.  I'd guess you an find out more on the Rengade at Badger's site www.badgerairbrush.com

I have the new Paasche Talon and have just started using it.  It's a great performer,  You might want to look in to the TG-3F kit, it comes with all three size nozzles and needles plus a fan tip. 

http://www.chicagoairbrushsupply.com/patatgsetwia.html

Any thoughts on the Airbrush Depot TC-196 vs an Iwata Smart Jet and then how hard is it to add a tank to the Iwata?  All I can find on the TC-196 is that it's most likely made in China, and the Iwata is probably better quality, but I don't know how hard it is to add a tank to the Iwata so I don't have to deal with pulsing which is a problem I think since it's got no tank and it's not twin cylinder.

 I've also read some negative comments regarding Bear Air which makes me question buying their compressor, which is a shame because it being twin cylinder would negate the pulsing if what I've read is true.

Help!

(thanks for the info guys, everything I've found says Grex and Iwata are pretty much on par, with some leaning one way and others the other way... what about the Paasche Talon?)

If you have a Hobby Lobby near you I suggest you get their 40% coupon and use it on one of the compressors they stock.  They seem to be Sparmax or Paasche.  They also carry Paasche and Iwata airbrushes.  You can use coupons on seperate transactions, it depends on the cashier or manager.  You can end up saving big bucks.  Most stores carry the Iwata Eclips HP-CS and the HP-BCS.  Also Have the Paasche H and VL airbrushes.

If you want to browse different product and prices, check this link.

http://www.chicagoairbrushsupply.com/

They carry all the top of the line airbrushes including Grex, Iwata and Harder and Steenbeck.

You may want to look at the Harder and Steenbeck line, their aribrushes all are outstanding performers.

I just won the Iwata hp-cs last month at my IPMS meeting I have yet to use it but it is very well constructed and looks fairly easy to clean.I would try and get a compressor with a tank so it dosen't pulse when I used my old comp. with no tank it was kinda hit or miss now I have one with a  gallon tank (overkill for you but the price was right for me free lol) it made a world of differece with my badger 350 and 150.I would also sugsest unless you also get a spray booth to spray outside just to eliminate overspray and your health.I just read another post that the new one from model expo (portable) works well if vented. I just built my own but I'm also a metal fabricator so I own my own brake and welders and such but I have seen people build the outta wood(which I cant do I can't build anything out of wood to save my life lol) Hope this welps you out some.

John