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adding clear to paint in airbrush


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I occasionally do this by mixing Tamiya flat acrylics and their X-22 clear (around 1:1, or a little heavier on the paint). Then thin the mix with X-20A. This gives a slight sheen to an otherwise pretty flat finish. I wouldn't try to turn a flat paint into gloss this way, but is ok for a slight sheen.

 

My main concern with heavier and thicker applications would be the different curing and shrinkage rates of the paint vs clear. It can cause cracks in the final finish. 

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Hello

My objective is to find out if you can get exactly the same result using a can spray for color X example yellow by airbrushing the same color gloss bottle by adding clear to make it as gloss as the TS spray " i tried Tamiya TS yellow and   Tamiya LP8 yellow lacquer and it was not the same yet at the store i was told the lacquer color equivalent to TS range should be the same .  . Another question is by decaning a color and using the color through the airbrush will it give exactly the same color result and is this action the objective for small touch ups  ?

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Color match vs sheen match are two different things. The easiest way to do what you are trying to do is to decant the can and airbrush it. Only then should you expect what you spray through the airbrush to match what is in the can. Anything else has many parameters that would be hard to dial in unless you did endless trial and error. The context matters too. If you have a large area of already painted yellow (can), I can see blending in a different yellow (LP) by spraying more broadly beyond the target area and later clear coating to brig everything to the same sheen.

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So its decant , wait 1 day for the prop to evaporate ,  airbrush , clear . i find cans to be ruthless even at a distance and in movement , for large areas it can overspray and run creating large deposits at corners . I find myself wasting a lot of spray as well . What i like about cans is that strong uniform gloss finish to the major surface .

Edited by Dog1
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If you want to get ultra-glossy finish from your airbrush, after getting down your color coats, try a few finish coats with very high amount of thinner, and wet sand with very smooth grit sanding pads between. 

 

Obviously use gloss paint as well...

Edited by kozlok
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If you want to get ultra-glossy finish from your airbrush, after getting down your color coats, try a few finish coats with very high amount of thinner, and wet sand with very smooth grit sanding pads between. 

how many coats of thinned clear and which grade sanding paper , by very fine you mean 4000 to 10000 ?

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5 hours ago, Dog1 said:

how many coats of thinned clear and which grade sanding paper , by very fine you mean 4000 to 10000 ?

 

Wet sanding with 2000 grit should do the job. Going above that has limited returns for scale models. 

 

Cheers,

 

John

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No, you can't turn flat paint into gloss by adding clear gloss, and you can't turn gloss paint into flat by adding clear flat.

 

Now, I *do* like to use a 50-50 (or so) mixture of clear and paint to modulate the color a bit of a monotone paint scheme.  For example, an olive drab P-40 is pretty boring if you don't do something to the finish, so I'll take a bit of a lighter color OD than what I used for the base color, mix it with clear, and spray it on select locations of the model to produce slight-but-noticeable variations in the finish.

 

Mike

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