Hi All,

I'm getting into building scale armour again, and I have a quick question regarding Tamaya's acrylic paints.

I'm not sure if it is something that I am doing wrong, or if its a technique issue. However, I find that the results are inconsistent.

What I mean to say is that a lot of the time, I find the paint is inconsistent. I brush paint only (I don't have the room for an airbrush setup, nor have I worked with it.) I find that at some times, regardless of how much it is mixed, the paint is very watery, as well as does not stick to the plastic/styrene very well. I also find that regardless if I'm using brushes, cotton swabs, toothpicks this is the same. I also notice the green (XF-6 Flat green, and Nato Green) tends to come out a yellow green in spots.

So my question is, is there any way to improve technique, or use some other type of paint?

Regards,

Ian,

I believe the answer to your question is yes and yes.Tamiya acrylics are not the best for brush painting on bare plastic. However,if you must brush paint as you say I would recommend priming the plastic first with some Tamiya spray primer and let it dry before painting.A better alternative if you can switch would be to use a good brush friendly paint such as Vallejo.It's best applied by thinning it a bit with water and painting successive layers to build up the colour. It drys fast so you can paint successive layers quickly. Vallejo also has a huge colour range. Enamel paints are also an alternative such as Humbrol or Testors. I used Humbrol paints during my first go around in the hobby when I didn't have an airbrush.

Thanks for the reply Dave,

I'm quickly finding that the enamels (model master) are a better solution to my problems.

I've been mulling a switch to Vallejo over the last few weeks as I've noticed more and more problems with Tamaya's paints.

I've just started to work more on priming bodies and do see some difference, as well as a quick build I did using enamels (there was a large quality and ease difference.)

Does age of the models come into play? I do a mix of them right now, some newer, some from 20-30 years ago. I did read somewhere that models from back then needed to be primed, while newer ones is a question of choice.

With Vallejo, what would be a good mixture of water to paint? Is there any good ratio?

My paint range is Model Master, Testors and Tamaya, so is there any other things I should be aware of? There's about 4 hobby shops around I can go to, each has all the paints listed. I currently have in the drawer a bunch of all three I have built up.

Regards,

Hi Ian,

As far as the age of the plastic goes I don't see this as an issue. I am building a Tamiya M4A3(75)W Sherman here on Armorama and the kit is from the 90's. Its pretty old but aside from some texturing with Mr. Surfacer I spray painted the tank with Tamiya acrylics right over bare plastic. The new paints these days are much better than they were when these older kits were made.

For Vallejo you could try a 60/40 water to paint mixture and see how that goes. Vallejo have very good pigments and will give you good coverage so don't worry if after painting your first few coats you can still see the plastic underneath just keep going and you will soon see it cover quite nicely. Some Modellers use brush painting in layers when doing a hard edge camo scheme on German Armour.

I think you got it covered in terms of paints.

for brush painting and some airbrushing i use modelmaster and as for tamiya i use tamiya nato colors for airbrushing due to modle master dont have those colors a good thinner to use with tamiya paints when airbrushing is isopropyl alcohol it works great and the paint dries super fast i can do a Leopard2 or M1A1 in 3 color nato in less than a hour