RBTKraisee

Like a few real Mk1 coaches have in recent years, it looks like John's TSO is heading for a new home, here in Florida Woo hoo! Ross.

Mick, While Robj's suggestion might be the operational fix I need to continue working without problems, I still want to try to figure out what was the underlying cause for the disconnection spills, so I can avoid the issue in the future. I don't *think* the paint is too thick. It was mixed 50/50 with lacquer thinner and appears to have the milky consistency that I've seen in multiple youtube vids. The original paint out of the pot seemed to flow perfectly normally too, so I don't think the source was in poor shape either. Certainly for the spectactular 'gusher' event, the vent hole had definitely become restricted by some dried paint and that was clearly a contributing factor to retaining pressure for a short while after backflushing. The vent hole wasn't completely closed, but was perhaps 1/4 the normal diameter - and that was enough to allow the pot to pressurise. I've now taken to using a small nail, the right size for the hole, to keep it closed when in storage, but removed just before use - it helps to prevent the hole getting clogged-up. I'll try to do a full battery of these "thinning tests" this afternoon (on both bottles - if I have enough of the blue paint) and I'll let you know the results. Ross.

Robj, I just tried this technique a couple of times and it appears to work! Thank you! Ross.

Hi Mick, Neither water nor Medea Airbrush Cleaner seem to do the same thing as the paint, no. The only difference is that the cleaner is in the Iwata bottle that came with the airbrush, where the water and all the paint is in 3rd party bottles The two bottle types seem pretty similar in design. Visually, the feedlines look to be the same internal diameter, the vent holes look to be about the same too - they are just from a different manufacturer. They got 4.5 stars/59 reviews. Hi Robj, That's a good idea, and seems fairly low-risk I'll give it a try later today and report back. Hi Torper, Bought this airbrush brand new from Hyatt's in Buffalo, NY through Amazon. Since this spill issue started, I have taken it completely apart (followed instructions in an Iwata deep cleaning vid) and everything seems to fit perfectly and be in good order - at least to my untrained eye. Ross.

Hi John, Cool. I'll PM you! Ross.

Trying to find a matching one for an existing GF rake. Closest I can find so far is the M4870, which is only available in the GF Digital Commuter Set. Anyone know of any other alternatives? Ross.

So... I thought this was a great way to prevent my spill issue, but after giving it a try, I will NOT be recommending trying a backflush with a siphon airbrush. All I can say is, thank heavens that we had a cold front come through my area last night, and I was able to go outside for today's painting session. I did an initial paint run trying to paint some wire/latex trees that I'd made. Everything worked great, and when I tried the backflush it seemed to work well - no spill. Woo hoo! What I didn't pay attention to at the time, is that almost all the green paint had been used and the bottle had hardly anything left in it. I then went back to my blue test parts, cleaning the brush in between, and aiming to get a few bits of coverage that I missed last time. The painting went fine. Disconnecting the blue paint bottle afterwards, errr, not so much... Y'see, unless you know what you're doing (I sure don't, total newbie here) and are extremely gentle with the backflush, you might end up partially pressurizing the paint bottle. Turns out that the small vent in the lid can get partly clogged with dried paint during the session, so the resulting hole just isn't always enough to dissipate the backflush pressure quickly. You can see where this is going, right? So, unless you wait for a few minutes, you still have plenty of pressure in the bottle when you disconnect it. The resulting jet of paint streamed 6ft across the yard! I didn't stop to take a picture before cleaning up my better half's plant pots and tiles, but after that cleanup I took a picture of the overspray catch box I was using and you can probably see from the state of it, just how much paint went flying. Note the brick on the top. The paint got two feet above it! I can laugh about this because it didn't do any permanent damage to anything, but I probably won't be giving that particular solution another try any time soon and painting indoors is likely to get nixed going forward! Ross (still with blue fingers).

Backflush? Not familiar with airbrush lingo yet, I'm guessing you mean covering the nozzle so it can only blow back into the bottle? I've seen some folk doing that for mixing paint in gravity fed airbrush cups. It sounds like a good idea to try. I'll let you all know what happens tomorrow :) Thanks, Ross.

What paint do you use here?

Drat. After another good painting session, I tried detaching the bottle while still spraying and got much the same result - maybe one or two fewer droplets. Image attached. I guess I'll just have to expect it, always do it over something non-valuable, and keep plenty of paper towels handy If anyone can think of anything better, please do chime in! Ross.

Hi John, Our place is pretty small so I don't really have much choice. Florida humidity makes doing it outside impossible, and we don't have a shed/garage. The one bedroom is carpeted, so the dining room with it's tiled floor get used when everyone else is out for the afternoon and I can air the place for an hour after I finish. I also use an R95 full mask and a fold-away spray booth, with extractor. The arrangement has allowed me to use rattle cans before, but this spillage issue with the airbrush is a new phenomenon for me. Even my first practice run yesterday showed me that the airbrush instantly produced better coats than the rattle's ever do, so I really want to be able to use it - without damaging anything else. Ross.

JeffP; It didn't look like it was from the pipe on the top of the bottle, it looked like it was residual fluid that had been pulled into the airbrush, but hadn't yet made its way out the nozzle. And paper towels - check. On my first practice, I certainly noticed how messy this can get Makes almost as much mess as my resin 3D printer does! MickB; That makes sense. I'll give the spray-while-removing technique a go (with more paper towels) and see if it fixes this. I also took the whole unit apart last night to see if there were any issues - and to get more familiar with all the bits, and I watched a few vids on how to clean & maintain the unit properly. Everything seemed firmly hand-tightened, and I couldn't detect anything out of alignment, so I'm guessing the seals were probably okay. But I'll keep an eye out for loose bits as a potential issue down the road - thanks for the heads-up on that. This advice is very much appreciated. I'll let you know how my next run goes! Ross.

Hi John, Our place is pretty small so I don't really have much choice. Florida humidity makes doing it outside impossible, and we don't have a shed/garage. The one bedroom is carpeted, so the dining room with it's tiled floor get used when everyone else is out for the afternoon and I can air the place for an hour after I finish. I also use an R95 full mask and a fold-away spray booth, with extractor. The arrangement has allowed me to use rattle cans before, but this spillage issue with the airbrush is a new phenomenon for me. Even my first practice run yesterday showed me that the airbrush instantly produced better coats than the rattle's ever do, so I really want to be able to use it - without damaging anything else. Ross.

Hi all, a bit of a dumb issue, but I definitely need some advice from more experienced hands! I've picked up an Iwata Revolution HP-BCR siphon airbrush and started to experiment with it yesterday evening. But when I go to change the pot underneath it, a small gush - half-a-dozen big droplets - of fluid spills out onto the floor. I was using some Model Master enamel, thinned about 50/50 with lacquer thinner. The spill happened twice in a row, yet thankfully nothing has been damaged (dining room table, chairs, trousers, shoes etc), but if this continues it's only a matter of time before I splatter something valuable and my better-half skins me for it. So I erred on the side of caution and stopped until I could consult with more knowledgeable experts. Has anyone here ever experienced any similar issues? And if so, what did you do in terms of a reliable solution? Thanks in advance, for any advice! Ross.

That's brilliant. You can even see all the old mounting holes in the wall there! I'll definitely be modelling all the different clocks If I can find mechanisms small enough I want to try to make them all work! Ross.

That's great Mike! That's the first shot I've been able to get of the walls, side-on - and you can count every brick. Brilliant! Thank you for this, and for PM'ing me too. Greatly appreciated. Ross.

Apologies if it's bad form in this community to resurrect an old thread as my very first post here, but I've gone through all 16 pages on this thread and it is clear there are people here who know King's Cross far better than I, so I wanted to try to reach out for your help. I'm in the process or designing an N-gauge KX station, circa 1990's (attached are some images of my early stage work) - but I've come across a bit of a snag in terms of accurate dimensions - specifically I can't quite get a solid bead on the height for the main shed: From photo's inside (example), I get 148 bricks from platform to the top of the main shed walls/the roof line. Assuming 65mm tall bricks and 8mm of mortar as an average, that puts the wall at around 10,796mm tall. But the drawings I've found of the early 2000's redevelopment of the station suggest its more like 11,900mm - a 10% discrepancy. I'm trying to figure out what the real number looks like and I'm hoping someone on here might be able to help nail it down. Thanks in advance for any assistance - it's greatly appreciated! Ross.