Hi From Pennsylvania

JatoTheRipper

JatoTheRipper

Young Tutorling
Hi. I'm Tim from PA. Airbrushing has always intrigued me. It started early on when I was a child that got my name airbrushed on a Sea World monster truck T-shirt while visiting Florida. Now roughly 30 years later I picked up my first airbrush. I got the Central Pneumatic Deluxe Airbrush from Harbor Freight. I know this seems to polarize opinions. I've never even held an airbrush before. I also picked up a compressor side moisture trap to use on my Craftsman compressor. I picked up some Createx Wicked airbrush paints and some Createx airbrush cleaner.

From the little research I've done, it seems to me that reducing paints will be a difficult task to master.

I'm big into RC cars and trucks. My goal is to be able to paint some designs on the lexan bodies. At this point, all my bodies have been painted with rattle cans. I'm not going to start here though. I think I will paint a pumpkin this year. Before that it was suggested that I try food coloring on paper towels.

My garage is very cold in the winter so I'm going to have to warm it before I paint. What is the possibility of painting inside my house or basement with an airbrush? I don't know if it's virtually impossible like it is with rattle cans.

Thanks.
 
welcome aboard Tim,
the airbrush will give you a feel for what you need to do for now, once you're hooked then look at one of the more reputable brands, it will save you a lot of headaches.
Reduction varies so much, its dependant on temperature, humidity, air pressure etc etc etc.... but you'll pick it up as you go,
the Wicked is a waterbased paint so as long as you mask up and keep the pressure low (high pressure will result in every thing within a 5 mile radius getting covered LOL ) then you should be ok in the basement. look at possibly putting a ventilation fan in somewhere if its possible,

practise on whatever you can get your hands on, printer paper works for practising dots / daggers
 
Wow, hello and glad to see another Pennsylvanian (from Harrisburg area myself) as for thinning paints some paints are more of a pain than others and just when you think you have it all set... a bit of humidity can change everything. You can pretty much all acrylics without nasty fumes but I recommend a mask... at the very least a a drywall dust mask up to a full respirator. I use Createx Wicked Detail paint and I spray in my shop in basement and use a mask like they use for 4 wheel ATV's ect.
 
Welcome from New Zealand... practice lots. You can airbrush inside depending on pressure. The deal is solvents AND overspray. Look forward to seeing your work and how you go... it can be tricky so keep at it... :)
 
Thanks, all!

I want to keep this cheap until I figure out if it's something I'll stick with. I know cheap isn't always good, but it will get my feet (or hands) wet.

I think my next step is to get a mini airbrush compressor to use in the house. Obviously my other compressor is way to loud to use in the house. I was looking at the mini air compressor with tank and without tank on TCP Global.

I also looked at some booths eBay. The small ones are much cheaper than I realized. I don't think an RC car body will fit in one, but it seems like it would give me a good place to practice inside.
 
Hi Jato welcome from the uk. Many people spray indoors (low pressure), I think the basement would be fine, as long as there is nothing nearby to catch any spray that gets away, a little booth would be ideal.

Just to warn you, unless you are lucky, and get one of the good ones, staying cheap may end up being more of a hinderance than anything. I really believe those people who tried ABing and decided they couldn't do it, gave up thinking it was them, when really they were let down by cheap poorly made guns, that either were never going to work well, or only worked the first couple of times. If that turns out to be the case, then don't give up, any branded brush will be infinitely better, and make learning much easier - there's enough to think about at first getting your air/paint/reduction ratios right, without adding a poorly performing brush into the mix. Plus a branded brush will have resale value if you decide it's not for you.
 
I know cheap isn't always good and sometimes more expensive in the long run. But I wanted to get my hands wet and see if I had enough interest to go farther and spend more money on this hobby.

I gave it my first shot tonight. I sprayed undiluted black food coloring on paper towels and a cardboard box. I had a lot of fun. I have to say I couldn't get fine lines though. Don Wheeler sprayed some pretty fine lines with this brush on his site. I can't so I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong.

I had a ton of fun though so I'm looking forward to doing more spraying.
 
Don can do it because he has been doing it for more than a few hours :D
Seriously though, this isn't quite as easy as the pro's make it look. Chances are Don had his pressure very low and the paint reduced spot on. You need to crawl before you can run and this hobby has a reasonably big learning curve that makes people give up. I actually find the challenge part of the appeal.
I started with cheap brushes, but knew I was hooked after the first session
 
Haha! Fair enough. I'm sure Don does have years and years of experience. I can tell after one attempt that the learning curve is much steeper than I ever anticipated!

I think pressure is one of my issues. The regulator on my air compressor won't go much below 40 psi and I'm not sure why. Even with it all the way open it still sits around 40 psi.
 
My father was from Pittsburgh. He graduated as an architect from Carnegie Tech and was always big on proper drafting tools.
 
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