How much should I thin Tamiya Clear Orange for airbrushing?

Turbo · Post by **Turbo** » Mon Sep 01, 2008 1:28 pm

Using a Badger 350?

Um. Not much more to the question than that.

Post by **TER-OR** » Mon Sep 01, 2008 4:27 pm

Their clears are pretty thick. The last time I put it over foil I thinned it with Future, maybe by half. Then I airbrushed several thin coats - you WON'T get one coat to be uniform without it running and pooling.

Turbo · Post by **Turbo** » Mon Sep 01, 2008 7:19 pm

Would you recommend 1-1 for clear plastic parts as well, or would you go with something more like 3 paint - 2 Future?

kenlilly106 · Post by **kenlilly106** » Mon Sep 01, 2008 7:22 pm

I go 50/50 minimum with 90% rubbing alcohol in my Paasche H.

I'll second TER-OR's comments on Tamiya clears, especially the spraying part.

Ken

Post by **TER-OR** » Tue Sep 02, 2008 9:22 pm

Yeah, I'd thin with Future - and consider getting a flow aid. Liquitex makes one called Flo-Aid which reduces the surface tension, and they make a drying retarder called Slo-Dri which you may not really need here.

Increasing the alcohol will make it dry faster, for this I don't know if I'd add alcohol. It can cause the Future to haze a little but usually not to any great degree.

If you screw it up, just drop the part into Windex and clean it off. I've tinted canopies this way: Future with water/alcohol/flow-aid/India Ink/pearl powder. I dipped 2 or 3 times to get the hue I wanted. I had to strip the parts after my masking/frame painting didn't work right a total of 3 times! The fourth time worked.
Of course the canopy parts were not attached to the model here...which made that process much more simple.

That was for these kits:
http://www.starshipmodeler.com/other/tm_exyamato.htm

Red Comet · Post by **Red Comet** » Wed Sep 03, 2008 6:40 am

I recently used Clear Orange on this build and I thinned it with Tamiya Acrylic thinner at a ration of approximately 1 1/4 part thinner to 2 part paint (ie just a tad over 50/50).

It took a few coats to get a nice uniform finish though so don't try to get it even on your first try as mentioned in previous posts in the thread.