Diluting Acrylics

In the case of Tamiya, the Tamiya thinner works better, especially with gloss paints. I normally use 91% isopropyl alcohol for thinning, but it will usually cause a flat finish with Tamiya paints. The Tamiya thinner appears to be mostly alcohol, I think it says something like "Contains isopropyl components" on the label, but I also think it contains some retarder since the paint dries much more slowly and seems to flow much better.

PolyScale recommends just using water to thin their paints, and that's what seems to work best.

With Model Master acrylics I usually use alcohol and have had no problems. I think it does make the paint dry a bit quicker, but a couple of drops of retarder solves that pretty easily.

Most people recommend using the manufacturer recommended thinner. In some cases I think it makes a big difference, but in others I haven't seen a lot.

One of the older Fine Scale Modeler issues had an article about thinning, and the Tamiya paints worked best with alcohol, at least 91%.

I'd been using the Tamiya thinners up until I read that article. I switched over at that point, and in my opinion, alcohol is far superior to the Tamiya thinner for airbrushing.

For other painting tasks, such as washing, I can't comment. I've only recently switched to alcohol as a thinner, and I haven't tried everything yet, and what I have tried wasn't great.

For example, I tried a wash with an alcohol/Tamiya paint mix, roughly 10/1 ratio. I felt the mix was not thin enough, leaving streaks on the large flat areas of the tank..

Just one person's opinion.

Nat

I use a mixture of 50% Isopropyl alcohol and 50% distilled (filtered) water to thin Model Master Acryl. It seems to work well.
Trying out a retarder for the paint may help also.

Mike

I use Floquil Laquer thinner with MM. It's touchy and my skills are still a little dull after a long nap from modeling. It's a potent thinner and not much is needed defore it turns the MM to colored water that is very hard to spray with.

-Jeff

Jeff,

He is using acrylic paints. That Floquil you use would not be very good in acrylics.

Mike

Thanks for the info.

I'm not familar with retarders. I assume it slows down the drying process. Is there a specific brand that's best? How much do you use?

John

John,

There are several brands out there including Golden, Createx, and others.
I have a small, sample bottle of retarder made by Aqua-Flow and I have only tried it a couple of times and it did slow down the drying process.
A little goes a long way and I only put one drop from an eye dropper into the small amount of paint I mixed. It was about 1/8 oz of paint I would guess.
I think Scott (MusicCity) has used it quite a bit so maybe he can add something.

Mike

I've been using retarders for a few months now, at Mike's recommendation, and they do make a world of difference. The brand I use is Createx but mainly because it was the first bottle I grabbed at the art store. It's about an 8oz bottle, and it cost around $5 I think. Using 1 or 2 drops at a time I figure it will last longer than I will

I really don't think the actual percentage is that critical, at least not with this brand. I usually put a couple of drops in my paint before I start airbrushing, but if I'm hand brushing details I actually use it for thinner. I'll put 5 or 6 drops of paint in a film can cap and add 3 or 4 drops of retarder. On a percentage basis that's a little over 50% retarder! Depending on brand, even at that ratio, it will dry in anywhere from 5 to 15 minutes.

Also, the airbrush I usually use is a siphon feed brush, and I keep thinned paint in bottles so all I have to do is stir it up and screw it on the airbrush. I usually mix about 4cc at a time (3cc paint + 1cc thinner) and each time I use a bottle of paint I'll add a couple of drops of retarder. I don't know if it oxidizes out or not, but if it doesn't some of the bottles have a pretty high percentage of retarder, and I still don't see any overly long drying times or curing problems.

Oops thanks mike I use enamals.
Note to self *wear my glasses when reading forums*