First time with Mr Surfacer

i advise using their own mr leveling thinner, remember its laquer based if you wan tto try something else.

id use the 1200 for priming and maybe the 1000 if its in a rattle can  the jar stuff i use for filling in small cracks or slowly building up joints to a smooth finish.

jar stuff can be thinned for airbrushing but hav enever tried it

the Jar MR. surfacer 1200 is my only primer. It works fantasticly in the airbrush when I thin it with Mr. leveling thinner. I usually thin it 1 part paint to 2 or 2.5 parts thinner. This stuff likes lots of thinner to go down smooth. Otherwise it will spider web and go on rough like, which is fine after wet sanding it away. When its that thin I find it takes 3/4 coats on the model to cover. When I'm done I clean up my airbrush with cheaper hardware store laquer thinner.

What Nathan T said.

Also, Mr. Surfacer really benefits from a wet sanding with a fine-grit sandpaper (1000 or 1600 and up). It'll go from a good primer coat to glass smooth.

Thanks for all the help thus far. Now two more questions:

-Thin exclusively with Mr. Thinner? Regular lacquer thinner won't cut it?

-Supplier? Squadron and Sprue are out of stock. Ebay sellers are overseas. Is that my only option?

Again, thanks so much.

There was just a thread here a few min. ago about Mr. surfacer where art though? Had some good sites in the states for it.

Thanks again. The primer arrived yesterday. My local has the Tamiya thinner. I'll post results when the priming is done. Hopefully in this lifetime.

Just be sure its the Tamiya Yellow cap thinnner (laquer) not the white cap(acrylic).

Spent yesterday and today priming, wet sanding and repriming the Hasegawa P-51 I'm building (first build in about 19 years). I used the 1200 thinned 2.5 to 1. It worked great! I'm really happy with the results I got and will now do a light wet sanding with some 1600 grit sandpaper to get the glass like finish that was discussed. Thanks for all the help.

Glad your getting one with it!

I love Mr Surfacer and have had great luck with it so far, but keep in mind you don't really need to use a heavyweight primer like that unless you're spraying some fairly caustic paint or need to fill in a scratchy model surface.  And there are very few paints made for modeling that are really that nasty.  Even Mr Color (a somewhat lacquer based paint...kinda...) isn't going to melt your model if you spray it directly.  Alclad *might*, though I've heard many anecdotal tales of it spraying just fine onto bare plastic.  I love it under alclad due to the scratch-filling and how smooth you can get it for a high-shine finish.

If you just want to normalize the color base for the model you're working on prior to painting or pre-shading, you can use just about anything.  Ditto with priming for low-bite acrylics to give them a bit more toughness.