Varnish, wash, thinner mismatch

Matt.

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This is what I use starting from the basis that lacquers are by far the best performers through the airbrush.

First: get rid of sanding rubble, finger grease and other contaminants from the surface with a good wipe of isopropanol alcohol.

Primer:
MRP lacquer based primer though I consider Stynylrex (and white labelled versions) a decent alternative.

Base coat:
Always MRP, these are the best airbrush paints so why use anything else.

The MRP lacquer metallisers are as good as the paints. So these are used where spraying metallics.

Detail painting with hairy stick.
Water based acrylics are best for this so I use the MRP water based range or Vallejo. These work well over MRP, lacquers would be a problem in re-activating the sprayed colour.

For metallics though I use AKI’s wax metallisers which thin with enamel thinners. The coverage is excellent but you have to make sure that you apply a decent varnish coat over them before weathering.

Varnish.
ideally a water based varnish would be best such as Alclad Aqua or Vallejo would be best over MRP but I have often found that these will pool and be problematical. I therefore use lacquers as these varnishes spray as faultlessly as the paint. Therefore it is MRP. Care has to be taken though not to ladown heavy coats because if you do the paint will be reactivated and will be a problem. So these are used in very light coats building up slowly. Thee great thing is that MRP provide a matt, semi-matt, gloss and semi-gloss enabling you to get the sheen that you want, not necessarily the same all over a model.

I do keep some enamel varnish as I find this useful to use with a hairy stick to replicate glass dials and similar.

Weathering washes
Always over varnished surfaces. The only exception being the MRP metallisers, I try not to varnish over these to preserve the metallic effect. I use AKI and Mig enamel washes. These tend to work well over the lacquer varnish, run nicely in panel lines and removing the surplus does not remove any varnish. For safety I do leave the varnish a longer curing time than I usually do, an hour or so rather than 30 minutes, before washes.

So water, lacquer and enamel products can work well together with each having strengths that are complimentary to each other.
Hi Barry, can I ask what you use to remove the surplus enamel wash?
My routine at the moment is.
Tamiya primer decanted from a spray can then airbrushed, tamiya XF, gloss coat with alclad 2, decals, alclad 2 then finish with a 50/50 mix of humbrol matt and tamiya lacquer thinners.
everyting going really well with the above untilI wanted to try adding a wash for the first time and the varnish.
It’s annoying that my stumbling block is right at the end process, I dread to think how many hours I spent on my Brewster to ruin it at the end.
cheers
Matt
 

BarryW

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Hi Barry, can I ask what you use to remove the surplus enamel wash?
My routine at the moment is.
Tamiya primer decanted from a spray can then airbrushed, tamiya XF, gloss coat with alclad 2, decals, alclad 2 then finish with a 50/50 mix of humbrol matt and tamiya lacquer thinners.
everyting going really well with the above untilI wanted to try adding a wash for the first time and the varnish.
It’s annoying that my stumbling block is right at the end process, I dread to think how many hours I spent on my Brewster to ruin it at the end.
cheers
Matt
I use ordinary white spirit. You only need a brush to be dampened with it.
 
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Komedy

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Hi Barry, can I ask what you use to remove the surplus enamel wash?
My routine at the moment is.
Tamiya primer decanted from a spray can then airbrushed, tamiya XF, gloss coat with alclad 2, decals, alclad 2 then finish with a 50/50 mix of humbrol matt and tamiya lacquer thinners.
everyting going really well with the above untilI wanted to try adding a wash for the first time and the varnish.
It’s annoying that my stumbling block is right at the end process, I dread to think how many hours I spent on my Brewster to ruin it at the end.
cheers
Matt

Matt can you just confirm exactly which Alclad 2 you are using - is it ALC-600-60 or ALC-310-60.

Warren
 
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Matt.

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I use ordinary white spirit. You only need a brush to be dampened with it.
Hi Barry,
Wow, all varnishes stood up to white spirit. Thank you so much.
With all the trials I’ve done over last 7 days I’m going to give VMS a go as it airbrushed fairly easy, gave a fairly decent gloss (going to matt most things back down at the end anyway), gave the toughest surface in a very quick time and panel wash flowed well. Just putting a few decals on to make sure no reaction with decal solutions.
Thanks again. Matt
 
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For gloss varnish acrylic go for Alclad 11 Laquer Aqua Gloss Clear. Recommeneded to me a couple of years back.

Not had one problem. airbrushes perfectly & easy to clean airbrushes.

Very thin does not clog panel lines. Dries quickly very quickly. Very understanding if you over do it. Dries & smoothes out magically.
 

Matt.

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Winsor and Newton low odour solvent turned up and pleased to say it cleans off the wash without touching the varnish. It doesn’t wash it off as quickly as standard white spirits but I’m not getting moaned at “what’s that smell”
 

Matt.

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For gloss varnish acrylic go for Alclad 11 Laquer Aqua Gloss Clear. Recommeneded to me a couple of years back.

Not had one problem. airbrushes perfectly & easy to clean airbrushes.

Very thin does not clog panel lines. Dries quickly very quickly. Very understanding if you over do it. Dries & smoothes out magically.
Hi Laurie, sorry for not replying sooner been a busy week, is the alclad 11 lacquer Aqua you use in a glass jar? This is what I’d read about about a year ago but mine is in a big plastic bottle and takes days to dry. I think there maybe 2 products and I bought the wrong one. If so I’ll add a bottle to my next order. Thanks Matt
 
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I know it's a bit late in proceedings for this thread but I've finally worked out and emulated the problem that I had when I answered Matt's initial post. I've just gone through a repeat of -

a) Ammo One-shot primer (grey) - 2 days drying (airbrushed)
b) Ammo acrylic paint coats (s) - 2 days drying (airbrushed)
c) Ammo acrylic clear gloss 2 coats 48 hours apart (4 days drying) (soft hairy stick)
d) Application of Micro Set - residue wiped and dried.
At this point there was no contamination of the coats nor any evidence thereof, then ...
e) Application of Micro Sol - residue washed with water and dried

which immediately demonstrated that Micro Sol reacted and cut into the Ammo clear coat and by doing so left a noticeable colour change due to the destruction of the gloss finish.

(sigh) Just another product incompatibility to deal with! And up to this point I had been very pleased with Micro Sol and it's performance, as well as being enamoured with the finish of the Ammo clear products.
 

Tim Marlow

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With the micro sol Try another clear coat over the top, it should restore the finish....
 
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With the micro sol Try another clear coat over the top, it should restore the finish....
I did that, Tim. There was improvement but the earlier effect is still obvious. More coats would probably improve it. With decals like roundels I always restrict use of Micro Sol to the decal itself ensuring nothing runs/spills off the decal surface. That makes any marks hard to discern, however, it's no help with other shapes like letters, numbers etc, and not with silvering of the edges.

With the model I mucked up early in this post another strange phenomena occurred in that subsequent coats of Ammo clear over the decal wouldn't take. In fact the clear coat over the decals turned into blobs - which I'd never struck before. The decals were allowed 24 hours drying between Micro Sol and the next gloss clear coat.
 
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I did that, Tim. There was improvement but the earlier effect is still obvious. More coats would probably improve it. With decals like roundels I always restrict use of Micro Sol to the decal itself ensuring nothing runs/spills off the decal surface. That makes any marks hard to discern, however, it's no help with other shapes like letters, numbers etc, and not with silvering of the edges.

With the model I mucked up early in this post another strange phenomena occurred in that subsequent coats of Ammo clear over the decal wouldn't take. In fact the clear coat over the decals turned into blobs - which I'd never struck before. The decals were allowed 24 hours drying between Micro Sol and the next gloss clear coat.

Easiest solution is to ditch Micro Sol and try something else. Any suggestions?

Ditched all the Sols some time ago. Been using Daco Products strong decal setting liquid.

Superb stuff. i use strong all the time but they do two lesser strengths. Not had any reaction on varnish.

Let the decal dry. Give a coat of Deko. Look useless. Go away come back 15/30 minutes later & it moulds around hinges into panel lines.

Used it on some difficult objects & has worked perfectly. Fot thicker decals it is a must.
 

rtfoe

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I've been reading this thread and am baffled why there is a problem. All you need to know is basic knowledge of the difference of the chemical make up of the paints and solvents in use. Water based or petroleum based or plant based.

Cheers,
Richard.
 

Matt.

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Hi Murfie,
I use micro set and micro sol without any issue an I don’t do any varnishing between.
Just a thought and I could be completely wrong. If you are cleaning with water could it be the water reacting with the acrylic varnish layer?
 
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Hi Murfie,
I use micro set and micro sol without any issue an I don’t do any varnishing between.
Wow how do you do that Matt.. ? With most paints it is almost impossible not to get light reflected back on the the decal backing.
Producing silvering. Do you use gloss paint ? With a matt paint the decal gloss backing is bound to stand out against that matt finish..
 
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I've been reading this thread and am baffled why there is a problem. All you need to know is basic knowledge of the difference of the chemical make up of the paints and solvents in use. Water based or petroleum based or plant based.
Quite so, Richard. Therefore it follows that given the chemical composition of Micro Sol then you should not use it with any water based acrylic products.
 
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My line of thinking is to try things on spare bits. It gives the best clue as to what does & not work.

Given that trial must include ensuring that effective curing has taken place.
 

rtfoe

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Quite so, Richard. Therefore it follows that given the chemical composition of Micro Sol then you should not use it with any water based acrylic products.
Yes, I think most decal solutions have a trace of vinegar which creates white spots on varnished acrylic surfaces. This disappears after an over coat of the same acrylic varnish. It is a bit disturbing at first but I'm used to it now and know how to eliminate it.

Cheers,
Richard
 
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Yes, I think most decal solutions have a trace of vinegar which creates white spots on varnished acrylic surfaces. This disappears after an over coat of the same acrylic varnish. It is a bit disturbing at first but I'm used to it now and know how to eliminate it.

Cheers,
Richard
That does not happen with Daco products. The surface is undisturbed after the Daco dries.

On small surfaces used decals on matt surfaces. The Daco hides the tranparent edge even on matt surfaces & leaves not a trace on the paintwork.
 

Matt.

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Wow how do you do that Matt.. ? With most paints it is almost impossible not to get light reflected back on the the decal backing.
Producing silvering. Do you use gloss paint ? With a matt paint the decal gloss backing is bound to stand out against that matt finish..
Hi Laurie, I maybe mislead you on that, sorry. I gloss coat micro set the decal on, micro sol to get it flat, gloss again and then finish with matt
 
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