airbrush concern

If you recoat within a couple of minutes, no.  That is, sometimes when I am doing several parts, I paint one coat on all the parts and by the time I get done I can go back and put another coat immediately.  In that case, I do not clean brush.  However, if you are going to wait more than, say, five minutes, then yes, you need to clean the airbrush.  This is especially true of acrylics.  If acrylics dry in the airbrush (and they dry very quickly), you have a hard time cleaning the brush.  Enamels are a bit more tolerant, but you can still wait no longer than a few minutes.

If its only a few minutes between coats,no,if your wating a few hours or until the next day,you need to clean it out.I have waited 15-20 minutes with no problem.

I mostly use enamels and lacquers and only rarely spray acrylics.  Like Don, I usually don't disassemble & clean my airbrush during a painting session if I'm going to apply a second coat with in a short period of time or if I'm going from one color to another.  What I will do is spray some appropriate thinner through the airbrush to clean it out.

The exeption would be if I'm going to go from a solid color to a clear coat.  Then I field strip and clean the airbrush to get any remnants of the previous color out so it won't affect the clear.

Mark

thank you

baillie1

if, for example i want to airbrush three coats ,do i have to clean the brush between coats? my concern is the paint will dry in the air brush while it's not being used. how long between coats  using vallejo paints ?

I found the approach that works for me the best are building up the solid color in multiple passes light coats continuously. I do no stop or plause until I get the color I want or refill paint.

The trick is to get a good quality airbrush (not all are created equal). Thin the paint sufficiently and spray at the proper distance at moderate pressures. You have to try different combination to find the best result you like.

Here is a video by Phil Flory that I found helpful to me.

There are many good airbrushes on the market. I have  3 of the moderately priced ones that work well for modeling. Any of these should serve you well, Iwata HP-CS, Harder & Steenbeck Evolution Solo and Badger Krome. You may want to get one that you can get replacement needle and nozzle locally cheap.

thank you

Thanks for posting that video, Keilau! That was a great introduction and I think I'll benefit from it.