Thinning paint - what do you use to measure

I keep spare paint bottles (cleaned after the paint is gone) for mixing/thinning paint. When I crack open a new bottle, I just pour straight into a clean bottle, about 1/3rd full. Then, using a pipette, just squirt some thinner in there for a roughly 60/40 (paint/thinner) ratio. No science for this simple guy!

 You can get syringes that'll fit into a paint bottle that are marked in MLs if you want to be precise.

I just eye-ball it using a plastic pipette-  go for about a 50/50 mixture.  I have found that exact proportions are not really critical.  If it has the viscosity of about 2% milk when you dip a stick into it, it's about right. 

I just wing it...kinda like Cadet Chuck stated, 2% milk look to it...each paint brand is different, thinning is more critical on some than others.

I use my Opticalman calibrated Mk1 Mod 0 eyeball & the 1 oz jar that came with my Paasche VL.

Reid

I pretty much do it by eye. After they're mixed in the 1/2 oz jars I use, I give it a shake, open the bottle, and observe how it coats (or doesn't coat) the sides of the jar to get the right consistency.

I find pipettes are the easiest way to measure paints and thinner. I purchased my pipettes on Amazon. I got a case of 500 for $17.00 with free 2nd day shipping.

Graduated disposable syringes, usually 1ml & occasionally 5ml for overall colour coats, I use mainly acrylics so cleaning isn't a problem - a couple of pumps with water & their clean.

When I say syringes, these things are usually called "oral dispensers" or "Enteral dispensers", they are readily available at pharmacies & generally used to give reluctant babies / children medicine. Some brands are not so good as the plunger seal will swell even with alcohol, but others are fine. I'm not if the sure if they are available in the US, but the Baxa ExactaMed range works well for acrylics & enamels, they also tend to last far longer than disposable pipettes;

I use glass eye droppers from the drugstore and count drops. I'm often using small amounts so I've used the small clear plastic lid from some spray bottles - put ten or so drops of thinner then same number of drops of paint, stir, eye ball the consistency and pour in the AB and spray. If mixing larger amounts, I use medicine dose cups marked in ml and tsp or whatever.

I just eyeball it,worked so far

I gave up trying to actually measure ratio by transferring paint. I have gone to using the Mark 1 eyeball and pour directly from paint bottle into an airbrush jar and adding thinner to get mix ratio I want.  Practice makes perfect. One does not need to be accurate to a one percent accuracy or anything like that.

I also found I needed to increase the amount of thinner when I found I could no longer find Testors airbrush thinner at hobby shops and had to resort to hardware store mineral spirits.  I had previously noted the difference in airbrushing with the Testors stuff versus hardware store stuff but find I can now get same results by just using a somewhat thinner mix.

In the past I have used a gram scale to be precise but now I look how the paint slides down the side of the paint cup. The scale was a little overkill but it works.

Bill

THanks for the replies everyone. I'm with you on usually not needing to do be exact, but I've come up with a interesting way to handle the raised panel line kits. What I do is shade every sucessive coat a little darker, with a base coat of aluminum. I use a sanding pad - like 2000 grit and sand it down. Rivets and stuff come up silver, and the panel will shade unevenly because of the raised panel lines. Worked pretty good for a dauntless I did until I botched it up by clear coating it for decals. I'm almost done with a Stuka and I pained the markings on it.

I think mostly I'm trying to avoid wasting paint and making a huge mess.

Thanks again!

Plastic pippettes and Mark I eyeball.  I mix in the airbrush cup and after a while you get a touch for it.  As stated above, you want it about the consistency of 2% milk, just enough paint to leave a little bit on the side of the cup when you draw a toothpick up from the  paint.

Bob

I use empty pill bottles (from the chemist) and mark with a permanent marker 10 marks equally spaced. that was i can mix paint to a required ratio if called for, and then i just drip a bit of thinner in at the end. (im a brush painter)

I use 3 ml pipettes and Ausf. B. eyeball. 

Milairjunkie

Graduated disposable syringes, usually 1ml & occasionally 5ml for overall colour coats, I use mainly acrylics so cleaning isn't a problem - a couple of pumps with water & their clean.

When I say syringes, these things are usually called "oral dispensers" or "Enteral dispensers", they are readily available at pharmacies & generally used to give reluctant babies / children medicine. Some brands are not so good as the plunger seal will swell even with alcohol, but others are fine. I'm not if the sure if they are available in the US, but the Baxa ExactaMed range works well for acrylics & enamels, they also tend to last far longer than disposable pipettes;

 

I know for sure Walmart carries these.

I fortunately work in research science and was able to pick up a few old 5cc glass syringes from my lab.

Before that I used both glass and plastic pipettes...they weren't graduated, so I was marking them with a Sharpie, or guesstimating when I had matching volumes.

Measuring is nice to ensure I'm not completely out to lunch, but in the end, the swish around the paint cup tells me if I got it right.

Cheers,

From paint bottle to AB cup where I use a plastic eye dropper to add thinner until it looks right, usually 50/50 mix, thinner for very fine mottling.