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AKAN acrylic paints drying out in unopened bottle


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Hello All,

 

I am having a problem with some of my AKAN acrylics paint. Out of 45 bottles of various colours, 11 of them have completely dried out. I found this out when setting up to paint some FS36440 onto my Tamiya Tomcat and found the unopened bottle completely dried out. Some of my previously opened bottles have dried out but these 11 bottles were sealed and unopened.

 

Has anyone here experienced the same thing? Could freezing during shipping affect these acrylics?

 

All of my AKAN paints were purchased through Hobby Colours. I will be ordering replacements as I love their colour selection and the way they airbrush.

 

Cheers,

 

John

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Yes, I had the same happen on basically all my water based acrylic bottles - although I have to add that these were from very early batches. About 5 years or so ago I switched completely over to their acrylic lacquers, and I'm happy to say that none of those have dried out yet.

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I just went through my drawer of paints: Every single one of my AKAN acrylic bottles have dried out: Both the ones that I have used and the unopened ones. As I said, these were all from early batches.

 

I also have AKAN enamels (8 series), from about the same time: Also all dried up.

 

Most of my collection of AKAN paints are, however, acrylic lacquers (6 series), which I started buying as soon as those became available: Those bottles are all perfectly fine - new ones, old ones, used ones and unopened ones.

 

I wonder if it was a packaging problem on earlier batches of AKAN paints? Possibly imperfect seals?

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Same thing with all my AKAN water based paints, all dried to a sledge,  most bottles unopened. Add some Tamiya X-20A thinner and let it stand for a while, the paint will thin back out and be usable again. I bought mine at least ten years ago and was finally going to use them on the new Arma Yak-1b

Edited by Chuck1945
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On 4/12/2020 at 12:16 AM, Chuck1945 said:

Same thing with all my AKAN water based paints, all dried to a sledge,  most bottles unopened. Add some Tamiya X-20A thinner and let it stand for a while, the paint will thin back out and be usable again. I bought mine at least ten years ago and was finally going to use them on the new Arma Yak-1b

 

Thanks for the tip. As I said, I switched to the acrylic lacquer based version, but it would be a shame to throw the water based ones away. I'll give it a try.

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  • 1 year later...
On 4/11/2020 at 4:16 PM, Chuck1945 said:

Same thing with all my AKAN water based paints, all dried to a sledge,  most bottles unopened. Add some Tamiya X-20A thinner and let it stand for a while, the paint will thin back out and be usable again. I bought mine at least ten years ago and was finally going to use them on the new Arma Yak-1b

 

Just bringing this back to the top with an update. 

 

I did try the Tamiya X-20A trick and it worked for some but not all of the dried out bottles. The ones it didn't work on just turned into a gooey sludge that will not mix with the X-20A.  

 

I ordered some new AKAN acrylic paints last year from Hobby Colours, 29 bottles in fact, and about 6 are still okay with the rest showing signs of thickening in the bottle. I'll be contacting them to see what my options are as using AKAN acrylic paints is getting too expensive if they have no shelf life. Might just have to move over to MRP as they sound like they're a real hit.

 

Cheers,

 

John

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16 hours ago, CF104 said:

 

I ordered some new AKAN acrylic paints last year from Hobby Colours, 29 bottles in fact, and about 6 are still okay with the rest showing signs of thickening in the bottle. I'll be contacting them to see what my options are as using AKAN acrylic paints is getting too expensive if they have no shelf life. Might just have to move over to MRP as they sound like they're a real hit.

MRP is an acrylic lacquer. AKAN also has an acrylic lacquer range - these are the ones labeled 6xxxx. All my AKAN water based acrylic bottles (7xxxx) dried out eventually, but NONE of my AKAN acrylic lacquers has dried out. Some of my bottles of AKAN acrylic lacquer are now about 6 years old and they all seem as good as new. Absolutely fantastic paint, right up there with Mr Color and MRP. Works great with Mr Hobby leveling thinner also.

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Do you store your acrylics close to a hot lamp or oven/radiator? You can get evaporation if you store the paint too close to any heating source  that might be the cause of the issues you report? 

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12 minutes ago, Niels said:

Do you store your acrylics close to a hot lamp or oven/radiator? You can get evaporation if you store the paint too close to any heating source  that might be the cause of the issues you report? 

I store mine in a drawer. No direct sunlight, no heat source, basically room temperature only. I live in South Africa, and it can be hot and dry here, but not excessively so in the house - I have no problem with any other paints or chemicals. The issue with older batches of AKAN acrylics (once again - NOT the acrylic lacquers) drying out, even in unopened bottles, has been reported by many. The bottles used for the later acrylic lacquers are different and, as mentioned in a previous post, I have not had any of those ones drying out.

 

I don't really like using water-based acrylics anyway and I'm very happy with the AKAN acrylic lacquers, but of course it was a little disappointing having to throw away the small collection of their water-based acrylics that I did acquire when I first discovered the brand.

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13 hours ago, Niels said:

Do you store your acrylics close to a hot lamp or oven/radiator? You can get evaporation if you store the paint too close to any heating source  that might be the cause of the issues you report? 

 

Absolutely not. That would be the worst thing for paints. Honestly I feel it's a continuing issue with the AKAN acrylic range with the packaging not having a very positive air seal as some of my latest purchases from last year are doing the same thing in the newer plastic bottles. It would appear that this drying out is not an isolated event as a web search brings up quite a few others having the same issue. In comparison, I've never had issues  with Model Master, Tamiya, Mr Color, Vallejo etc....

 

Anyway, no word from Hobby Colours yet (not surprising) but I've decided to bin all 81 of my AKAN acrylics and go with Mr.color and MRP paints along with my long lasting stash of Tamiya paints. 

 

Cheers,

 

John

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John, since MRP and Mr Color are both acrylic lacquers, have you possibly considered giving the AKAN acrylic lacquers (6xxxx) series a go? I use both Mr Color and AKAN and find the behaviour very similar. Mr Color just needs a bit more thinning , but all of them work extremely well with Leveling Thinner. I have not had the drying out problem with their acrylic lacquers at all.

 

What I do is use AKAN for all my Russian and Soviet colours - they are generally considered very accurate. For other nations, standard colours and metallics I use Mr Color (their Super Metallics are particularly nice to work with and very tough).

 

I think Mr Color, although fairly expensive where I live, is particularly good value: It needs lots of thinning from the bottle so their little 10ml bottles go a very, very long way.

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I store mine inside sealed ziploc bags and non have dried out, they are going on 6 years old now. But, I did have one color that I shot on an SU-27 that took forever to dry, may still be a bit tacky, haven't checked in a while. Painted the Flanker 5 years ago.

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