Do you backflush your airbrush?

Just been reading through the little leaflet for my new Wave Advance airbrush.

They actually mention backflushing as part of the cleanup procedure and recommend that the Airbrush be taken apart for a thorough cleaning after it was used 3 times.
BTW, it has a teflon gasket already build-in.

Can't tell you people how happy I am with this brush and consider it a steal at $118 will be picking up the Advance 02 later on this week.

The only airbrush I can backflush without fear of eventual damage is my Paasche-H. The "color adjustment part", specifically the nozzle mixes the paint and air externally and the washer inside the nozzle is solvent proof teflon. For my Iwatas and other airbrushes, I simply turn up the air pressure to around 40 psi according to my cleaning instrusctions (Iwata) and pull back the needle via the cut-away handle. This thouroughly cleans the nozzle. I follow up with a thinner moistened q-tip and swab the color cup, remove the needle and wipe clean.

Yep, I backflush mine to. But I haven't ever seen paint where it doesn't belong in my Omni or 200. I use gravity feed brushes, and that's really the easiest way to get the paint out of the pickup tube between colors. A bucket of water and a few shots each direction and they are nice and clean. At the end of the day, I completely strip them down and clean them from one end to the other.

Also, when I pull the needle out of my Omni I remove the nozzle and push it out the front so I don't get paint in the back parts. And, when I install it I push it in from the front instead of the back to help prevent damaging the tip.

QUOTE: Originally posted by buff Would it be possible, for the benefit of airbrush noobs like me, to explain exactly what backflushing is. Is it spraying thinner/cleaner through the brush? Thanks in advance

Buff,

Backflushing is when you put your finger or a rag over the tip of the airbrush and hold it there while you push the trigger down and pull back for paint with thinner in the bowl or cup of the airbrush. This causes thinner to backflush through the airbrush and back into the cup helping to flush out any paint that may be stuck in there that didn't make it out when you just sprayed thinner through it after painting. It does help clean it but as was mentioned, it can also cause paint to blow back up the airbrush furthur than the cup and can actually backflush thinner and paint particles up into the needle bearing area where it does not belong. Paint should only be in the area between the color cup and the tip of the needle, if it gets any furthur back up the airbrush there is a potential of both causing paint and thinner to stay back in that area and causing the airbrush to stick and possibly even getting it beyond the needle bearing which could cause it to even get into the airvalve which is not good.

Mike

Would it be possible, for the benefit of airbrush noobs like me, to explain exactly what backflushing is. Is it spraying thinner/cleaner through the brush? Thanks in advance

I backflush my Iwata HP-CS after, and sometimes during, every paint session. I have often wondered if paint was getting up the needle beyond the cup, but I have had no problems with this technique. I only do it after I have already flushed the cup and have nearly all of the visible paint removed (as far as I can see viewing into the cup.) It helps to get the little cruddies up out of the nozzle area, and they never go any further than back into the cup, where I can fetch them out with a q-tip, or, I'll put a bit more thinner into the cup, shake it, and then dump the bowl into the trash without any further spraying.

Thanks for bringing it up, though, as I'll now take apart my brush just to see if anything is "up the shaft".

stinger

It won't hurt if you take apart the airbrush every time you use it, but I agree that it is better not to do it if you don't take it apart after each spraying session, which is what I do. I only take it apart after every two or three painting sessions.

Mike

I have been doing it for 15 years ever since I bought my first airbrush and have never had a problem. I can see where the airbrush is covered in paint and has not been maintained how this could cause a problem.

Yup, I do it. Every book I see here on modelling recommends it.

I can not tell a lie. I cut down the cherry tree ---- oh, sorry, wrong story. But, I did mention back flushing in another post.

The Omni 6000 literature, what there was of it, recommended back flushing as part of the AB cleaning routine. But a subsequent call to Coast Air Brush, I didn't talk to Dave, put the cabash on that procedure --- exactly for the reasons you state.