Alternative to Vallejo acrylic paints

Hobby Lobby is starting to carry a broader range of Vallejo paints. It seems to vary by store, but you may want to look there if there is one in your area.

Chris, I had to do it because they soon will be sold out. It didn't make sense to me to buy one of each of the 4 SEA colors for a Phantom, and then have them be all sold out when I went to build about the 3rd USAF Phantom in my collection. So, I got things like 21 bottles of Aeromaster Camo Gray for the bottom, 22 Bottles of Flat Light Gull Gray, 6 of SEA Tan, etc, etc

I placed a small "quality check" order at first,,,,,,,,and I figured that if the paints were still this good at 10+ years in that storage shed,,,,then they would still be okay 5 years from now.

Rex

700 bottles of acrylics?  Well, I have 250 Tamiya bottles and 100 Vallejo bottles :). I just do not want to run out of paints.

Good man ;-) Thanks for the hunting tips.

Stik

Amazon for " Floquil Polly Scale " , Ebay for " Floquil Aeromaster "  , 4 or five online shops still have Polly Scale (though you can not get all colors from each of them, you have to hunt around

online shops are Tower , Sprue Bros , Mega Hobby , Hobbymasters , Internet model trains ,,,,,I think that is all of them?

also, Hobby Town USAs still have Polly Scale RR paints, and I have a friend that just closed his Hobby Shop in Smyrna, TN, he still has about half of the Polly Scale Warbird colors from his shop.

I just got a box of 18 Aeromaster Clears on Thursday (1/23), and have a Tower Hobbies Polly Scale shipment that tracks as arriving Monday via UPS

I think I said this before in another thread,,,,,,but, in the last two years after switching to Acrylics, while everyone was talking about "not being able to get them",,,,,,,I have bought 500 bottles of them (out of 700 bottles of Acrylics), which I figure should last until a new company comes out, lol. Anything I run out of I will just use LifeColor and MisterKit for.

Rex

Rex, where are you still finding Aeromaster and Polly Scale paints? Both lines are OOP, and long gone from the local shops.

Jay, Gunze acrylics are no longer imported into the US, but their Mr Color line is. They require their own thinner and do not clean with water. Their hand brushing qualities are mediocre. If you don't like enamels because of thinner I advise you to steer clear of these as well.

Italeri Acrylics hand brush decent enough. Their viscosity kind of reminds me of the old Polly S paints. They have a reasonable line of colors currently, but their line is not extensive. They are made by Vallejo, but in my view have better packaging.

One other option you might want to look in to is if there is a craft store such as Michaels, or a Walmart or Hobby Lobby nearby to you, have a look at some of the craft paints. The paint names do not match modelers colors, but they have very extensive lines of acrylic craft paints that can be matched to what ever colors you need. And they are less expensive than our hobby paints.

Yes, Nathan, in my opinion it is.

Lifecolor is thicker than we are used to in the jar, but, it really thins well with LC thinner, or a water mixture home brew thinner. and if you over thin it, you can get the body back with their thickener (the thickener is intended for another use, but, it works to fix the error)

It also comes out to be about the lowest cost of all the Acrylics in the end, because the bottle size is 1 1/2 times the size of a Model Master/Polly Scale/ Aeromaster bottle, for about the same price as the 15 oz Polly Scale price. You also don't get as much LifeColor wasted, they already come with caps that don't seal along the outer edge.

home brew thinner for LifeColor and Polly Scale/Model Master is make a 50/50 mix of distilled water and windshield washer fluid, do 1 pint at a time in a 1 quart bottle, add Pledge Future (10%), Flow Aid and Slow Dry in tiny amounts (you need to experiment, because every brand works differently) Drop in 10 Hematite beads and shake the mixture gently, by just turning it over and over until you can't see "blue swirls" in the mix when you turn it over

I have thinned LifeColor as far as 50/50, and turned the air pressure way down under 15 psi, near 10 psi, and had it work with less tip dry (the Slow Dry really helps keep tip dry away)

some add Windex, or Chlorox Green or Simple Green to their Acrylic thinners mixes, but, I don't see any difference with or without it

hope this helped

Rex

Rex, is Lifecolor better than Vallejo's line?(for airbrushing)?

I replaced all of my Vallejo/Italeri paints with Aeromaster, Polly Scale, and Lifecolor

All three are great for hand brushing, Lifecolor is the easiest to get now, but, you can still get some of the PS and Aero colors.

Rex

JayF

Hi guys

 

For hand brushing, people here seem to like Vallejo acrylic paints a lot. Thing is they are extremely difficult to find where I live. I have easy access for Tamiya acrylic (great for airbrush) and Testors enamel though.

 

I once tried Citadel colors for Warhammer figures, and they are great. The only problem is the price : they are extremely expensive for a single bottle (like almost 3 times as expensive as Tamiya for about the same color). 

I was wondering if you could suggest some alternative.

Why not order from a major online store like scalehobbyist?  Although local HL has Vallejo paints, I order from scalehobbyist. 

How about Lifecolor then? Amazing for hand brushing, and is also acrylic. As far as Gunze goes, I buy mine from Hong kong. If I had to rely on U.S. availability only, I'd have virtually no good modeling supplies.

Gunze, really ?

I thought they didn't export their paints in Canada and the US anymore due to some chemical laws or something.

And like I said in the OP, I mostly use Tamiya for airbrushing. What I’m looking for is a paint best used for hand brush.

Acrylic if possible, for a simple reason : cleaning ! With enamel the only way to clean is with paint thinner that leaves a nasty smell in the house ... 

If you have no personal problems with enamels, and are a hand brusher, Testors enamels work pretty darn good. If you have access to the Humbrol enamel line, those are really hard to beat for handbrushing. Testors acrylics are  ok for handbrushing although they do tend to have adhesion and translucency issues on unprimed surfaces. But they have better properties for handbrushing compared to Tamiya or Gunze (both Mr. Color and Mr. Hobby lines)

I agree with Nathan. Gunze paints are awesome for airbrushing. I almost only use Gunze Aqueous paints.

Do you airbrush or hand brush? If you airbrush mostly, I'd suggest Gunze. Either the Aqueous or the Lacquers (Mr. Color line). Whatever you can get.