Using Liquitex and such acrylics in an air-brush

Those types of acrylics are intended for use on porous surfaces such as cloth or paper, not for non-porous surfaces such as plastic. I don't know what sort of binder you would be able to find to get them to stick to plastic. My recommendation would be to use the paints that are designed for styrene unless you are looking for an unusual color.

QUOTE: Originally posted by gawga Is it possible to use Liquitex and other such acrylic paints in an air-brush?

Strictly speaking you can spray anything through an airbrush that the nozzle will allow. If the pigment particles are too big it will clog. My badger Crescendo will spray dirt if I put it in the cup (I wouldn't recommend it but it will do it). Alot of the fine line airbrushes like an Iwata hp-c are not even designed for paint, they are meant for stuff like ink.

I don't know what to thin Liquitex with. Either water, IPA, or Lacquer thinner. You'll have to test each one. I think liquitex would be good for dio surfaces but like MusicCity said, no go on the plastic.

QUOTE: Originally posted by MusicCity Those types of acrylics are intended for use on porous surfaces such as cloth or paper, not for non-porous surfaces such as plastic.

Really? Tell that to all my figures...

Anyway, I've airbrushed Liquitex and Winsor & Newton acrylics with no trouble. On Liquitex's site (www.liquitex.com) there are some really helpful postings for this. Couple things to remember: Use their Airbrush Thinner and Flow-Aid. Try not to thin much past about 25% or so, it'll affect the opaqueness of the paints. Also, if you can, use the medium viscosity paints, the stuff that is in the tubes is too thick to thin enough for airbrush use without affecting transparency (if that isn't a problem, then go to town!).

I've had really good luck mixing some of the interference colors into my paints, get some really cool effects that way.

Dan

Yes you can use Liquitex paints on plastic. Where I work we use a combination of ppg laquers and liquitex acrylics to paint prototype models. The two paints can't be intermixed. It helps to have a primer coat down first. I recommend using the med. viscosity paints with the airbrush medium made by liquitex to reduce them with. The pigments used are of a better quality and are better for airbrushing then your typical model paints. You can spray properly reduced liquitex with a .2mm nozzle.
If interested you can check out www.rjstudios.com after a long wait for the page to load you can see some of the prototype models that we have painted.