OK, I looked up some other threads about orange peel and it seems the only way to deal with it is to sand and reshoot. OK, I'll do that. However, I want to be sure that I'm not causing the problem in the first place. So, here's what I did, tell me if the orange peel (and other flaws) are "just one of those things" or my fault.
I was painting an old USS Oregon kit (Glencoe) from the 80s. It has been thoroughly cleaned in warm, soapy water. Note that the kit was in very good condition after storage, I'm even using the original decals.
My paint was gloss white in a WalMart rattle can.
My paint booth was homemade. I used a box that used to hold a clothes dryer. I cut out a hatch in the front that is about 2 feet by 2 feet. There is a furnace filter (brand new) at the back.
The paint seemed to be going on just fine when I sprayed. Immediately after spraying I placed the parts under a box to protect them from dust. The box has a couple of holes cut in it to provide air circulation, and the holes are covered with coffee filters.
Note that some of the parts had Testors flat white on them, and some didn't. Results were similar on both sets of parts. Besides the orange peel, there was some crazing (probably not the right term) that looked like the all-right-angles crack pattern that forms in lead housepaints, except that the pattern was raised instead of cracked. This occurred in a few small isolated areas, and the finish around those areas is generally good and free of orange peel.
So...I know I probably need to add a fan downstream of the filter, but is there anything else I'm doing wrong? I'd really rather not brush paint the white on this model, there's an awful lot of it and the parts are in such a light gray that I don't think a primer would do anything other than adding another layer of paint.
Can anybody help?