AIr compressor issues

Is your airbrush gravity or siphon feed?  Single or double action? If it is a siphon feed you may not have your regulator set high enough to pull the paint up out of the jar. If it's a double action thete is a chance that even clean your needle is sticking and your trigger is just sliding back without actually pulling the needle to release paint.

It's a gravity fed Badger DA.  When I had it off the hose, I looked at the needle and it is being pulled back.  

If you can't blow air back into the cup by backflushing, something must be blocking that path. Either that or the air pressure is extremely low.

Don

I agree with Don, you may have rolled an "O" ring out of its seat causing the blockage as well was the intermittent functioning. You may not realize it has happened  if you clean after each use by taking it completely down then reassembling and not using it for awhile. Gravity fed should work with alot lower pressure than siphon but it is worth checking. My next question is since you cannot blow air back, do you feel it coming out of the nozzle?

I do feel air, but it's extremely low, even when I crank the pressure up to about 30.  I am beginning to think that air leak is more the problem than anything.  

Yeup, fix the leak then let us know if your problem still exsists. If your getting alittle air out of the nozzle with the pressure up then it isn't a blockage. Air has to be going somewhere.

Sooo, apparently the issue was OE.  I wasn't screwing the backing (?) for lack of better words.  Once I tightened the whole thing worked like a charm.  Makes me wonder if that's what was wrong with the other airbrushes I had...

No worries Peaches, happens to all of us. Glad ya got it fgured out.