Kittyhawk
Established Member
For some time I have been dissatisfied with the brush coats on my wooden aeroplane models so a little while ago I purchased an airbrush setup.
Since all I wanted to do was spray the canopies black and finish the models with a clear gloss varnish I opted for a simple generic brand single action syphon type as this appeared to be simplest to operate and the easiest to clean. Trial results were pretty patchy - some OK, some without much gloss, some with orange peel.
So as a complete novice at airbrushing I went online and read everything I could on the subject - probably a mistake.
The first issue was with air pressure. As a visitor to an airbrush forum I read a post where one fellow said he ran his brush at 11psi and someone else chimed in 'too high, I run mine at 10psi.' Well I don't know what sort of flash regulators they have but I can't get anything like that precision on the gauge. And the next issue is viscosity. The accepted standard is that the spray medium should have the viscosity of milk, but not just any old milk, it must be skim milk. One begins to wonder if the age of the skim milk is important, and the temperature, out of the fridge or ambient, and must it be cows milk or can you use goats milk? I was getting a bit annoyed with the whole business.
In the end I ignored all the experts and just did my own thing. The viscosity of the medium was reduced to just a bit thicker than that of water - no idea if it resembled skim milk or not - loaded the bottle under the airbrush and did a test spray starting at somewhere around 15psi. Then whilst spraying slowly reducing the pressure until the spray pattern just started to collapse and then increasing it just a tad. Again, no idea what the PSI would be. With the spray medium volume I keep this at the point where the spray pattern is fairly clearly visible, not too much so or so much less that its difficult to see.
This is very simple so possibly totally the wrong way to set up an airbrush but it works for me and I am very happy with the consistent results achieved.
Since all I wanted to do was spray the canopies black and finish the models with a clear gloss varnish I opted for a simple generic brand single action syphon type as this appeared to be simplest to operate and the easiest to clean. Trial results were pretty patchy - some OK, some without much gloss, some with orange peel.
So as a complete novice at airbrushing I went online and read everything I could on the subject - probably a mistake.
The first issue was with air pressure. As a visitor to an airbrush forum I read a post where one fellow said he ran his brush at 11psi and someone else chimed in 'too high, I run mine at 10psi.' Well I don't know what sort of flash regulators they have but I can't get anything like that precision on the gauge. And the next issue is viscosity. The accepted standard is that the spray medium should have the viscosity of milk, but not just any old milk, it must be skim milk. One begins to wonder if the age of the skim milk is important, and the temperature, out of the fridge or ambient, and must it be cows milk or can you use goats milk? I was getting a bit annoyed with the whole business.
In the end I ignored all the experts and just did my own thing. The viscosity of the medium was reduced to just a bit thicker than that of water - no idea if it resembled skim milk or not - loaded the bottle under the airbrush and did a test spray starting at somewhere around 15psi. Then whilst spraying slowly reducing the pressure until the spray pattern just started to collapse and then increasing it just a tad. Again, no idea what the PSI would be. With the spray medium volume I keep this at the point where the spray pattern is fairly clearly visible, not too much so or so much less that its difficult to see.
This is very simple so possibly totally the wrong way to set up an airbrush but it works for me and I am very happy with the consistent results achieved.
