DZC [001f]

Tonight I tried out the Vallejo surface primer.  It had been a while since I last used the airbrush in general but everything seemed to go fine. I just had to remember not to rotate my hand to hit the side of a model as this defeats the purpose of the gravity feed pot. I of course did this about ten times before I corrected and would spin the model and keep the airbrush upright instead. Much better and smoother operation after that...

For the primer I found that I needed to have the paint pot like 2/3 full or it wouldn't come out in high enough volume and I'd keep having to flick the lever to get the paint to come out.  Overall I think this stuff is great for getting the small and highly detailed models, that these Scourge vehicles really are, primed well.  The vehicle models are like the opposite of the infantry. Super detailed. Very cool stuff. I hadn't really looked at these models in a while and was pleased to see them in more detail which is part of what got me hooked on this game in the first place. 

I use q-tips every ten minutes or so, with a dab of the airbrush cleaner on the end, to clean out the tip of the airbrush and that seems to be fine for prolonged periods of one color. 

In about 45 minutes I had hit all of the vehicles with a longer first coat and then two more quick costs of the primer on top. Hopefully this will be enough to not have them scratch too easily and have the paint chip. I'll of course be sealing all of these later but I want them to be ok for initial painting. 

I thought it was funny as I was hitting them the second and third time that they were skimming around my paint station accidently from the high psi coming out of the air compressor.  These are small models and I was careful to hold them in place for the later quick coats. For the initial ones latex gloves were utilized and I just held them up while air brushing. I didn't really think about this before as I've never airbrushed anything this small and my other pieces never flew around the paint station before.  I noticed this the other day when using the normal citadel black spray paint can base coat. The UCM Bear APCs shot all over the place. Even with the can like 18" above the models.  Latex gloves and holding the models while airbrushing is a must for these guys. 

Not sure if I'll prime the UCM next or start some details on the Scourge.  Stay tuned  to find out :)

I'm adding an additional section to this post to reply to a question about airbrush cleaning.  I usually hit one color hard for the night, in this case primer, then I usually disassemble the airbrush and soak the parts that get paint on them in a 25% airbrush cleaner solution (currently using Vallejo air brush cleaner) with water over night. Then in the morning I rinse them all down again and let them air dry all day while I'm at work. They are then ready to go again that night when I usually paint. 

For cleaning during the airbrushing I just dip a q-tip in cleaner and swipe inside the tip shield cover every ten minutes or so, like I said above, so I don't get excess paint splatter. I have not really painted to switch colors a bunch during one session as I usually do large amounts of one color at a time.  When I have been painting for more than an hour you can rinse the paint pot with water, then 100% cleaner shake it up and dump out separately. Then spray the airbrush with the cleaner in the paint pot to clear out the needle passageway until only air comes out. Then you are ready for another color. Again I don't do this too much because I find it a pain with my gravity fed paint pot. For the other bottom feed pots this is a little easier if you want to switch colors a bunch I think.  If anyone has a good system for switching colors with the gravity fed pot it would be much appreciated for this upcoming project.