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The Best Propelant is R-22 Refrigernt or Co2 there Oilless , moisterless ,

and Clean.

Max!

I don't really agree with that either, a good compressor with tank and a water trap that provides constant consistant air pressure. Any form of compressed air will eventually fall off. moisture free is only in your air source anyway, your hoses can and will pick up moisture, which is why I use a water trap/air guage.

A refillable tank is ok, but not for large projects, if there is any chance of having inconsistant pressure you will run into problems, I like knowing my tanks are always full :D

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:D (but stuck in the Netherlands)

Hi,

I'm planning to do a fender 3-tone sunburst on my guitar. I don't own any equipment but I am inclined to go for the Paasche H because of all the above mentioned reasons.

My filling coat will be brushed on and my clear coats will be done out of Nitro-cellulose spray cans. I plan on mixing the dies directly in the lacquer that I will spray for the color coats.

For the sunburst, How many big cans of aerosol air will I need to do the front and back of the guitar?

For bursts am I better with the number 5, 3, or 1 tip?

Do I have to do multiple passes/coats of the bursts or only one? (since the lacquer is extremely dilluted)

Thanks

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i bought a vega 2000 (thayer & chandler), and am pleased with it. i got it for $60 as a kit (with extra bottles, 3 different tips, hose, etc) from coast airbrush. it's a siphon feed, dual action. prices are generally fair, and had a good purchasing experience from them.

one of the benefits of the vega series is this:

The innovative line-bore system allows for no internal needle bearing so you can spray solvents as well as water based paints without the risk of damage.

i believe that coast airbrush teflon coats the needle and bushings you get from them for increased resistance to solvents, but i could be mistaken.

and finally, kind of a cool picture of how it works.

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Worse than that releasing freon into the atmosphere is against international law B) Its also poisonous if it happens to catch fire. ON the subject of painting, I use an airbrush with a compressor and use two part automotive paint. I find that you get a good finish, but it takes ages for reasons mentioned earlier in someone elses post, I would stress to anyone who is considering buying any spray equipment, MAKE SURE YOU'VE GOT GOOD VENTILATION! Its about as bad as using spray cans indoors! Ive had to start painting in my kitchen, next to thw wide open windows. The massive headaches, nausea etc started getting a bit too much in my workshop :D:D

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[quote name='LGM Guitars' date='Jan 2 2004, 09:53 PM'] I just bought a Sata mini jet, it's a $300 gun, but worth every penny, it sprays great.
[right][snapback]50792[/snapback][/right]
[/quote]

LGM, do you use the HVLP version of the Sata mini Jet?

I have the Fuji Q4 system and it workes well enough but the gun is very coarse in its adjustments. I am thinking of getting one of the Sata mini jets for clear coat spraying.

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  • 11 months later...

Sorry about that if you saw it=dummy.

Hey, I was looking at that painting article you wrote... did ya' get everything ? Yikes, that was a huge iformation/comparison for sure! Thank you, I'll be printing that! I know what you mean too about using an air brush but only on a repair and even that is a mistake. I have a production gun but a touch up as well. This is the correct tool. Save ya a lot of hours.

I have a question for one who knows all about brushing. I went tp re[ly to another post and think I did the same dopiness there. I hit the wrong button without realizing.
Anyway, I am in the middle of using a black epoxy as filler as someone here had just mentioned. I just did inside the cutouts and a little edge - one side and corners.

The trick comes in here..I'm using it on mahogany which I bleached so far and stained with purple trans. Hit it with a light coat of lacquer to cover the color because the black cannot be added first as it would take off the bleach when you went to sand it down. So now, after letting the "seal" dry a day I've touched the top with 800 paper just to take off the overspray effect. I made a bunch of different applicators for this as I didn't want to sand much for obvious reasons. So, here we go - I hope it works XX I won't know till I actually sand it. Now, IF it works, I need to paint a sunburst people- I want it to be black, but what color black? I called a paint dealer for car paint. They told me that I'd have to look at a few chips and then, when I decide that the paint would cost about 48.00 a quart. It's worth buying the quart, I think only because the difference in price is remote @ 40.00 Pt. Anyway I wonder if buying paint from someone like this is a good idea. I never spent that much on paint before and wonder if I'll "see it", you know? Is it worth it is the question.

So, NOW I'll need to know how one of you might practice and on what, doing a sunburst in black, with what type of nozzle in an air brush. OR have any of you been daring enough to do such a thing with a touch-up gun?

It's just nice to know before you attempt beginning something like this lokking into it and a little practice can't hurt. Wow, all this in mind not even knowing if my sanding the epoxy works yet. It's a thin line to stain, you know?

Any ideas, hit me with them, eh?

Thanx-

Chris

Edited by Crysto
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[quote name='weezerboy' post='13720' date='Jul 8 2003, 08:39 PM']
....hi, is it possible to paint a whole guitar using a hobbyists air brush? if so what are the pros and cons?
:DB):D
[/quote]


here is my 2 cents.... use airbrush if you want to do graphics or sunburst. It takes little air or paint to paint the actual color portion of sunburst and you can use very concentrated dye mix if you are using air from a can. However if you are talking about clear coats either use a spray gun/compressor or if you cannot afford those equipments (lets face it, not everyone wants one cause thats alot of investment for a one time job, and a cheap gun doesnt spray that good anyways) then just use your airbrush to spray the color coats, and use rattlecans for clear. Cheap 20 dollar airbrush is great for sunbursting or just spraying translucent dye coats. If you are going to do graphics get better ones.

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It is possible to use for the base coat nd then use a gun for the clear. Like this one.
[url="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v195/Maiden69/DSC02028.jpg"]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v195/Maiden69/DSC02028.jpg[/url]
this base coat is a gold and copper burst followed by can clear.

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  • 4 months later...

Complete newbie here......dropped onto this forum by chance and the first thing I saw was LGM's explanation of airbrushes........great stuff!

Will be busily scouring the forum for more gems now!!

Jim

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Depends on what type and brand you used to airbrush with. I know Createx is popular, but I am not sure what type of paint that is. I know some guys who do this profesionally will use 2 part poly's for their artwork, so that can be cleared with 2 part poly. The key is knowing what you sprayed on first.

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I just saw this and figured I'd throw some info I've picked up. I got really into airbrushing, actually started from wanting to paint my guitar, hehe.

So, as far as paint is concerned, since that was a question that was just mentioned or whatever, you have to look at what your paint is for. Createx is not made for hard surfaces, a guitar is a hard surface. Createx is for textiles, so shirts, clothing, paper, canvas, stuff like that, it has been known to have problems drying on a hard surface, would hate to have your clear peel wouldn't ya? As far as good paints for a guitar, if you're lookin' at acrylics, you can go with golden airbrush colors, auto air (made by createx but for hard surfaces), E'tac (relatively new but apparently good, never tried it myself), and other paints that are meant for hard surfaces. Uro's are great to shoot, laquer's fine, basically you have to be able to thin it to the consistency of skim milk or so. I would say, like the others, do not clear with your airbrush, clear is so thick that it will have lots of trouble goin' through an airbrush, especially one with a smaller nozzle.

LGM covered the different types of airbrushes really well. A couple things to add, gravity feed uses slightly less air pressure to push the paint out of the brush than siphon feed does. Nozzle size wasn't covered at all it doesn't look like, so I'll address it now. Airbrushes come with different sized nozzles, basically, the smaller the nozzle the the smaller line you can make, to a point, it also depends on how well the airbrush is machined and how well the user can use the airbrush, as well as air pressure and paint viscosity, etc. If you shoot pearls or metallics or something like that you're gonna want to use something with a .5 nozzle or bigger, otherwise it will clog on you. Also, gravity feed airbrushes are better for detail because of the lower air pressure you can use with them.

Tip dry is something that you deal with on an airbrush, more often with some paints than others, but it happens with everything. It's basically when paint dries on the tip of the needle, it cause sputtering and clogging, just wipe it off with your fingers and keep goin', easy to fix, but gotta watch out for it.

LGM went over the various types of airbrushes but didn't touch any brands, so I'll put up a few different types trying to be as unbiased as possible. I'm gonna stick to double action since that's all I use and really don't like single action ones at all.

So, I'll start off with good overall airbrushes. The paasche vl is probably the most common airbrush around. You can get the set and have three different needle/nozzle sizes, great for medium and larger areas as well as pearls and metallics. You can do details with it, but it's more difficult than with something with a smaller nozzle. Badger in general makes decent brushes, I don't like them but that's just my personal preference. Iwata is a good overall brand, more expensive than many other brands, but well made and many people swear by them. Richpen makes good brushes as well, they're owned by the same company that makes iwata. In europe harder and steinbeck brushes are supposed to be very good, I haven't used them so I don't know for sure, but I've heard incredible things about them.

Now for the more detail oriented brushes. The richpen mojo is one of the best detail brushes you can get. It's modified by mike learn, a famous airbrush artist for those that don't know, and only available through his site [url="http://www.learnaibrush.com"]http://www.learnaibrush.com[/url]. It has a .2mm nozzle. It can get incredible details and is also cheaper than many of the other airbrushes in the same category, $299. The Iwata micron is considered by many to be the best detail brush around. It's based off of the olympos micron. The olympos is a much better brush, but the micron is no longer made and very, VERY hard to find. The iwata has a .18mm nozzle. It can be finicky because of the smaller nozzle, but so can all the other airbrushes with smaller nozzles. The micron runs around $565 or so. Harder and steinbeck has a newer brush called the infinity. It can have many interchangeable tips, .15 being the smallest and the one I'm gonna talk about. Having not used an infinity I can't tell you a whole lot about how smooth it is or anything. The only bad thing I've heard about it is that the trigger has a farther pull than other airbrushes. At around $250 or cheaper, depending on what version you get, it's a good deal. There are other good detail brushes but these are the most common and the better high end ones (that can be found easily).

As far as air source. A compressor is, in my opinion, the way to go. You get a constant air flow, that's the biggest thing you need with an airbrush. I would say stay away from the plain airbrush compressors, they aren't very good. Many of them pulse, which creates big problems when trying to airbrush. They also have problems with heating up a lot and and creating lots of water. Water traps are a must, but you should run at least 25' and probably 50' of hose before you attach it, that way the water vapor has a chance to cool and actually be caught by the water trap. Another good option is co2. The nice things about it is that it's quiet, it's constant, it's a decent air source. There are some problems, they tend to freeze up, stopping all air flow period. They also need to have a special regulator because of the amount of pressure they hold. Finally, they have to be refilled, which costs money, not a whole lot, but money none the less. Propellant cans are the last way to power an airbrush. I would stay away from those, they don't last very long, you can't control the pressure, just not very good at all.

I feel like there was more I wanted to cover, but it's 3:40 in the morning and I don't feel like thinking anymore lol. Pm me if anyone wants more information and I'll add more the thread. Hope you didn't get too bored with my novellette, hehe.

Thought of something. There's a third type of brush that wasn't mentioned, a side feed airbrush, basically the cup is on the side of the airbrush. There are gravity cups for this or the regular metal cups that come with the airbrush. The advantage of these are that you can spray at whatever angle you want, you could spray at the ceiling if you wanted you by turning the cup. You can also put the cup on either side of the airbrush to suit your preference. It's a siphon feed technically, but they act a lot like a gravity feed. The only downside that I know of is that if you get a giant cup for one and fill it with paint it doesn't balance well, it's not a big deal, but something to be aware of. I love my side feed mojo :D. The side feed is really great in my opinion. Oh, and just in case someone were to try this, you can't get a side feed mojo, I had him do mine special and the brush isn't made anymore, the richpen sidefeed, so I have the only one in exsistence and it will stay that way. :D Sorry, had to brag a little, hehe.

Again, ask me anything about airbrushing, if I don't know offhand I talk to enough professional airbrushers that I can find out for ya pretty easy. B)

Edited by anderekel
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Jeremy (LGM) used Createx for a while, so did DaveQ and me with no problems what so ever... Autoair is a better choice and there are a lot of "new" alternatives that are just a google search away. Createx are water based and dry fast and can be forced to dry with heat lamps with no problems like bubbles as other acrylic paints do. I have cleared them with nitro only but there should be no problem using any other type as long as it is completely dry.

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Yeah, I've heard of lots of people having success with createx, but I've also heard of a few that have had problems, so I figure it's better to be safe. What acrylic paints have you had bubble? I haven't had any bubble, but then again, I haven't used a whole lot of different brands of paint, pretty much just ones that are supposed to be heatset.

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