For lots of folks, they get all tooled up and ready to airbrush and it occurs to them that they’re going to need to clean their airbrush during paint sessions in between color changes and then thoroughly clean it after their painting session is over. These range from name brand products made by the same companies that make airbrushes and airbrush paint, to run of the mill household items that you probably already have under the sink or in the garage. These cheap cleaners remove dry, caked on Tamiya Acrylics with ease and my Evolution AB spends a fair amount of time in cleaner cos I forget to clean it after use. Vallejo Airbrush Cleaner works very well with the acrylic Vallejo Game Color which are a pain to airbrush. I squirt a bit of this into the airbrush paint cup between color chang4es and run it through, then a bit of distilled water (you don’t have to use distilled water, but where I live the water is very hard and stains/scales up everything so I use distilled).

Then I use a cotton wool swab soaked with Vallejo Airbrush cleaner to remove congealed paint in the cup before it gets down into the nozzle.

I find that the jar is large enough to hold all of my waste from a typical painting session so I just empty and rinse it in the sink afterwards. I also keep a cotton bud soaked in x-20a to dab on the needle and flush through with either Badger or Creative Model Airbrush Cleaner, these unclog. It can’t be 100%, and I know my Walthers Solvaset is far more aggressive so has more active ingredient. even the paint reservoir and a cotton bud took some effort, doesnt look like it did when it was brand new just prior to this test. Ethyl acetate is hotter than butyl acetate when it comes to melting plastic and also evaporates much more quickly.

If you use Windex, make sure that you wash it out thoroughly, as the ammonia can damage the chrome in the a/b.With traditional liquid cement, you would apply the cement to a part and then you would attach it where it belongs. When doing clean outs and color changes I spray leftover paint, cleaner and water into one of these Iwata Medea airbrush cleaning stations.

There’s really no reason to use such spendy cleaners in your airbrush when a readily available and much cheaper substitute can be used. Found there was a blob of paint very visible on the needle part way through spraying, 2 parts paint 1 part X20 thinners 20 psi. If you leave the glued parts alone long enough before handling them again, the bond is very strong and it is in fact almost impossible to cleanly separate them again. The ships arse end will stick out and as the garage is horribly dusty ( despite hoovering before every session ) i can see a few problems in the making. Using the jar keeps the vapor and odor in my work area to a minimum and completely prevents any spills.Just as a wee sideline to this I have started using Interdental Brushes from my pharmacy to deep clean my airbrush. Although it is a quick-setting cement, it still allows for some minor alignment corrections after the cement is applied. I get through maybe a bottle a year, and it’s just not worth the savings to go for cheaper bulk options for me! I build too slow and prefer the old slow Testor’s Liquid Cement in a Tamiya bottle most of the time. Great for getting the last of the acrylic paint from your brush even after you have cleaned it with water.

I have been using the airbrush cleaner as liquid cement for several years now and actually just refill the same old green top bottle with an eyedropper every so often from the airbrush cleaner bottle. As you would probably expect, there are differences in the chemical compounds used to produce these two types of cement. finished the session, though my old trick of placing a blob of thinners in the cap area to keep needle from dryingn out doesnt work as this cap has holes round it ! Even though the above process sounds a bit long winded, it actually only takes a couple of minutes each time and becomes sop much part of the proceedings, that you hardly notice it. Yes, the parts will stay glued together after within seconds of application but it takes much longer to form a strong bond.Airbrushes are becoming a very popular “must have” among the miniature painter crowd and for anyone new to the practice of airbrushing models there are usually a lot of questions to go along with that. Keeping your airbrush clean is fundamental to having a hassle free and fun airbrushing experience so it’s a good idea to develop a good cleaning regimen.