Airbrush viability

[MoblinMan]

I've been toying with the idea of investing in an airbrush for a while now.

My biggest concern however, is that I'm set up in my bed room, and have limited space. My painting area is a small computer desk in the corner of the room (Which is also a very small room).

I'm absolutely clueless about the properties of an airbrush, how much free space do I need to operate one without too much mess? In such a confined area am I likely to accidentally get overspray up the walls for example?

On another note what about ventilation? I'm set up next to a window, is this enough? It is a small room afterall, and I also share the house with a number of asthmatics.

Anyway here is a piccy of my set up, I'd love to give airbrushing a try, but I would hate to spend all that money only to find out its not a viable option in a confined area.

 

[-Ice]

Sorry, no ideas about airbrushing here, but I just have to say your setup looks awesome. Simple but functional... and your lamp and chair looks familiar. Argos? And table from Staples? I'm curious about that small chest of drawers there and that paint tray/rack/suitcase and that brush holder.

I definitely have to get another table for my painting area but as I'm only renting a room...

 

[Shellshock]

For overspray grab yourself a cardboard box, cut the top and front panel off and you'll be left with 3 walls and a floor that'll happily catch overspray, should be plenty of space to sit it on your cutting mat when you want to AB. If you splash out on a compressor rather than the propellent cans you've enough space to sit it on the floor to the right, you can buy a small pod thing to hold an idle AB and clean it out etc, search "jellyfish airbrush cleaner" in google, that's the one I use.

I have double the space you do by the looks of it, my AB is permamently setup though and I'm freaking messy as anything, you have a really tidy workspace lol, I'll take a pic in a min so you can see the space I use and what a disaster zone it is and I manage alright

 

[MoblinMan]

and your lamp and chair looks familiar. Argos? And table from Staples? I'm curious about that small chest of drawers there and that paint tray/rack/suitcase and that brush holder.

Haha your good, no way I'd have recognised them like that. Yeah the lamps from Argos, and I got the desk from Staples in a clearance sale last year. The chair was from Staples, 2 out of 3 isnt bad lol.

As for the rest, the brush holder was a £1 from The Range (They have a great arts and crafts section), the chest of draws type thing is a bits box I found in Netto. As for the Paint Case, it came with the paints. Vallejo do a number of boxed sets like this.

 

[ollieholmes]

Drop my freind a line here and he will talk you through your options and supply all you need:
http://www.little-cars.co.uk/

Personaly i cant see any problem airbrusing in that space. As the poster above mentioned a cardboard box helps with overspray or if your budget will go that far you can get complete spray booths for about £70.

As long as your spraying acrylic paints you should be oky with fumes, the problem comes more with lacquer paints or Tamiya paints. If your spraying either of them a mask is a worthy investmant.

 

[MoblinMan]

For overspray grab yourself a cardboard box, cut the top and front panel off and you'll be left with 3 walls and a floor that'll happily catch overspray, should be plenty of space to sit it on your cutting mat when you want to AB. If you splash out on a compressor rather than the propellent cans you've enough space to sit it on the floor to the right, you can buy a small pod thing to hold an idle AB and clean it out etc, search "jellyfish airbrush cleaner" in google, that's the one I use.

I have double the space you do by the looks of it, my AB is permamently setup though and I'm freaking messy as anything, you have a really tidy workspace lol, I'll take a pic in a min so you can see the space I use and what a disaster zone it is and I manage alright

Thanks! The cardboard box idea is a great one. I'll have to give that a try.

As for a tidy workspace, I wish I had one lol. That piccy is several months old, and was tidied especially for the photo (I was planning an blog article, and didn't want people to see what a scruffy git I am lol). The areas currently like a bomb site.

EDIT:

hehe see....

 

[-Ice]

Hehe... Argos has a chair like that too but the Staples one is better. I gotta go to The Range then, but I don't know what "Netto" is or if I have one close by (just moved to the UK). Is that a DIY store or a hardware store? I do have a big B&Q nearby so maybe I can find one there? As much as I like the paint case, I can't make the jump to Vallejo just yet. I like my materials consistent so I'm sticking to GW for now, especially since there isn't really and difference between the two paint ranges (ie, both are quality paints). Thanks for the help though, I really do dig the bits box.

 

[MoblinMan]

Drop my freind a line here and he will talk you through your options and supply all you need:
http://www.little-cars.co.uk/

Personaly i cant see any problem airbrusing in that space. As the poster above mentioned a cardboard box helps with overspray or if your budget will go that far you can get complete spray booths for about £70.

As long as your spraying acrylic paints you should be oky with fumes, the problem comes more with lacquer paints or Tamiya paints. If your spraying either of them a mask is a worthy investmant.

Ah thanks for the link. I still have Christmas to pay for first but I'll be sure to check him out when in a few weeks time.

 

[MoblinMan]

Hehe... Argos has a chair like that too but the Staples one is better. I gotta go to The Range then, but I don't know what "Netto" is or if I have one close by (just moved to the UK). Is that a DIY store or a hardware store? I do have a big B&Q nearby so maybe I can find one there? As much as I like the paint case, I can't make the jump to Vallejo just yet. I like my materials consistent so I'm sticking to GW for now, especially since there isn't really and difference between the two paint ranges (ie, both are quality paints). Thanks for the help though, I really do dig the bits box.

Netto is one of the foreign budget super markets we have over here, similar to Lidl and Aldi. As to whether they still have them in stock, I wouldn't hold your breath I got mine quite a while back. You maybe able to find somthing similar on Ebay or in a DIY store though.

 

[-Ice]

Netto is one of the foreign budget super markets we have over here, similar to Lidl and Aldi. As to whether they still have them in stock, I wouldn't hold your breath I got mine quite a while back. You maybe able to find somthing similar on Ebay or in a DIY store though.

Ah, I see. I would search eBay and such but I don't know what the proper english name for that is and my search-fu is weak so...

 

[MoblinMan]

Ah, I see. I would search eBay and such but I don't know what the proper english name for that is and my search-fu is weak so...

I managed to find a few similar items, though they seem a little overly priced (Mine was less than a tenner, and came with a 1000 bits included, which were great for sci-fi bases). I'm not to keen my self, these ones come empty and cost more (But then again I'm generally a cheapskate).

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/89470-DRAPER-..._Tools_Tool_Boxes_Storage&hash=item230957419b
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Cabinet-Box-2...326?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item1e5acc25be
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Cabinet-Box-4...577?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item20b43ea021
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Sealey-Tools-..._Tools_Tool_Boxes_Storage&hash=item43a36c5a08

 

[Hendarion]

My biggest concern however, is that I'm set up in my bed room, and have limited space. My painting area is a small computer desk in the corner of the room (Which is also a very small room).

Waaaay enough space. The brush is small, a bit of paper to cover surroundings is enough.

I'm absolutely clueless about the properties of an airbrush, how much free space do I need to operate one without too much mess? In such a confined area am I likely to accidentally get overspray up the walls for example?

If you are doing what I am doing, you need only 25cm*25cm. Walls aren't of a concern.

On another note what about ventilation? I'm set up next to a window, is this enough?

Yea, far enough for mini-airbrushing. I don't use any at all. Acrylic colours with a 0.3mm needle and a compressor (clean air) don't mess with your air in the room at all.

Note that these replies are valid unless you take an airbrush which is used to basecoat real-life-cars which give a HUGE spray radius of like 20cm instead of 2mm. The latter for small miniature or art-work is a tool that does not require much space.

 

[Einion]

Waaaay enough space. The brush is small, a bit of paper to cover surroundings is enough.

No it's not, not by a long chalk. If one is not spraying into a ventilated box of some kind - or out the open window - ideally all surfaces in the room should be covered with dust cloths.

Sound excessive?

Well airbrush just once for a couple of hours without doing this and come back to the room the next day and there'll be a fine layer of coloured dust on every horizontal surface in the room. That same dust is all over the carpet as well even though you won't be able to see it and it'll be disturbed by walking, moving a chair etc., prolonging exposure*. Some people could get away with this without any apparent ill effects for years, but despite a complete lack of symptoms you'd notice it actually is a major health risk for the long term, up to and including lung cancer.

*So even if you spray with a dust mask or ventilator on (which you should if not using a spray booth) you're not protecting yourself completely.

Genryu, I don't mean to scare you off the idea but the health warnings associated with pigments should not be ignored - even very safe pigments like Titanium White come with warnings not to inhale them.

In addition you mentioned you share the house with some asthma sufferers and they could be much more sensitive to the volatile compounds in the paint, as well as some other ingredients which become airborne when atomised (including humectant, dispersant, biocide and/or fungicide, anti-foaming agents).

Einion

 

[Hendarion]

Dunno what large nozzle you are using or how much colour your a blowing through, but I can assure you that I don't have such an issue. I mean not even in the slightest.

 

[airhead]

Enion is right on this.

Overspray is always a concern. Unless you are just putting a spot of paint on at a time, you will have overspray.

I've built several contraptions to limit it.
The simplest is a box fan with a good quality air conditioner filter taped to it. (the one that looks like pleated felt, not the fiberglass mat)
Even better is to point that fan out the window.

This will work for water based paints in limited amounts.

The airbrush atomizes paint to such an extent that a lot of it never reaches the model. Instead, it floats around the air as small dust particles - eventually settling out on whatever surface it lands on - furniture, your lungs, etc. I've washed enough out of my arm and nose hairs to testify to this.

Dust in the air in the right quantity is explosive. If you are using volatile compounds, they are flammable (enamel, lacquer, etc.)
If you are shooting volatile paints, then you get into explosion proof motors (read as expensive) for your exhaust fans and need organic vapor respirators instead of simple dust masks.

***
With asthmatics in the house, I would not recommend doing any airbrushing indoors unless you could set it in the window sill with positive (fan) exhaust out of that window.
***
Secondly, be careful when cleaning your guns. I've painted a ceiling blue, got some lovely pearls on a wall due to a blockage, and my fingers always end up technicolored. A trash can with several crumpled paper towels is great to shoot cleaning fluid into.

 

[Einion]

Dunno what large nozzle you are using...

It's not about nozzle size, but rather the total amount of paint shot through the AB. Obviously area spraying will produce more particles in the air than detail spray directed right at a surface but they can total to the same result, especially once you equal the spray time.

If the room is cleaned regularly it'll tend to ameliorate the problem and may make it harder to accept, but it is inherent to the process; everyone who sprays in an enclosed space without extraction is getting atomised paint landing around the room... think about it, you don't brush dead skin off onto a high bookshelf do you?

Einion

 

[MoblinMan]

I've actually experienced a similar effect before. I couple of months back it was raining outside, but I wanted to prime some models.

Rather than wait another day, I decided to put some paper down and spray them inside using one of the Army Painter spray cans, I didnt think much of it at the time, but ended up puzzled for days afterwards, wondering where all the white dust that was now covering half the surfaces of the room had come from. I eventually remembered I had been spraying inside.

The funny thing is, is that I really didnt do all that much spraying, yet the dust was everywhere and had travelled quite some distance.

Anyway I've been looking at some of those spray booths that Ollieholmes mentioned, some of them seem to come with built in extractors, the booths are pretty small, so I dont know how powerful the extractors are, does anyone here use one?

 

[ollieholmes]

Anyway I've been looking at some of those spray booths that Ollieholmes mentioned, some of them seem to come with built in extractors, the booths are pretty small, so I dont know how powerful the extractors are, does anyone here use one?

Ive never used one myself but ive seen one in use when someone was spraying Alclads which are a very fumy lacquer based paint and they work fine for that. Id still wear a mask though.

 

[airhead]

I've actually experienced a similar effect before. I couple of months back it was raining outside, but I wanted to prime some models.

Rather than wait another day, I decided to put some paper down and spray them inside using one of the Army Painter spray cans, I didnt think much of it at the time, but ended up puzzled for days afterwards, wondering where all the white dust that was now covering half the surfaces of the room had come from. I eventually remembered I had been spraying inside.

The funny thing is, is that I really didnt do all that much spraying, yet the dust was everywhere and had travelled quite some distance.

Answered your own question.

 

[Hendarion]

Einion and airhead, I think you are using totally different amounts of colours as I do. I use one drop of colour with 8 drops of water in my airbrush and normally I can put back 6 drops of that mixture into my colour pot when I'm done airbrushing. That is really not going to cover my walls or shelves and not something I need to care about too much. Yea, my lung... well, if I go out to buy food, I innihalate more molecular dust than by my airbrushing. I think the relation is important. It won't make sense to protect from something that has much less impact on me while ignoring the big ones. As if I would take a towel to remove my own sweat while sitting in a cold rain.