God I Hate spraying white!!!!

[Graham T]

Tamiya 1/48 F-14A & there's a LOT of white to paint.  I pretty much lay awake last night dreading the fact that I needed to get this done today.  As it happens it wasn't as bad as I feared but still took the best part of two tins of Xtracolour to achieve an acceptable result!

 

 

[bootneck]

24 minutes ago, Graham T said:

God I Hate spraying white!!!!

He is a member on here?    What's His username? 

 

Mike  

[Mike]

I use Alclad White Primer as the basis for any white that I paint.  It's really opaque, and you can give it a bit of colour modulation by varying the amount you lay down    Don't be tempted to add any patio grout to the paint though

[UKPonchoMan]

I'd highly recommend Tamiya TS-101 Base White. It sprays beautifully and gives a nice dense coat too

 

Chris

[lasermonkey]

I’ve just used the Colourcoats matt  white for the first time and sprayed with their own thinners, it covers very well indeed. 

[Graham T]

1 hour ago, Mike said:

I use Alclad White Primer as the basis for any white that I paint.  It's really opaque, and you can give it a bit of colour modulation by varying the amount you lay down    Don't be tempted to add any patio grout to the paint though

I wasn't aware of this stuff but I use their gloss black all the time for metal finishes base coat & if it's as good as that it's worth a try - especially with an anti-flash finish V -Bomber as a possible next project!  As you can see I've used Xtracolour here over the bare plastic - takes a few coats but acceptable!  The landing gear I first sprayed gloss black to provide bit of "preshading" which all but disappeared beneath the white!

[David H]

Hi Graham,

 

Having built 3 F-14 Tomcats, i clearly understand your agony.

 

Switching to acrylics and lacquers was largely driven by the difficulties i had with Gloss White enamels. Mainly, drying time.

 

Unfortunately, in the game of white, it's a tradeoff. You can go with a flat white that covers well and is relatively fast drying...but dries to a smoothness of 600 grit sandpaper. Or, you can go with a gloss white, which dries smoothly, but doesn't have very good covering power and takes a decade to dry.

 

This problem does not completely go away when you eschew enamels in favour of acrylics and lacquers, but the much faster drying times speed up the process by an order of magnitude. It depends largely on the colour of plastic; Mr Color and Tamiya Gloss white goes on over that Tamiya light gull grey plastic fairly well by itself but it doesn't have quite the brilliant opacity that you get when you lay down a flat white base coat. Having tried Tamiya White Surface Primer and Mr Surfacer Base White, the Mr Surfacer dries to a smoother finish.

 

At the end of the analysis though, the best result is obtained by laying down a smooth flat white primer, laying down a gloss white over it, patiently wet sanding it, and then laying another coat of white on and finishing with a heavily thinned down coat of gloss white.

 

If you want a cure for your insomnia, i go into more discussions regarding white in my Buccaneer build thread. Not sure if it helps but i do understand your challenges.

 

david

[Aigore]

A basecoat of Alclad white primer, a quick polish and the on with satin or gloss white...works like a charm 

[MagpieFNQ]

I have best success by spraying white over a black base coat

[Ad-4N]

Tamiya Liquid Surfacer Primer White + Mr. Color Leveling Thinner.

 

100% of the time.

 

Always consistently perfect.

[Bandsaw Steve]

11 hours ago, Graham T said:

Tamiya 1/48 F-14A & there's a LOT of white to paint.  I pretty much lay awake last night dreading the fact that I needed to get this done today. 

[Bandsaw Steve]

Don’t get too stressed mate. 
 

In the end everything will be all white. 👍

 

 

🤪

[kev67]

I use Tamiya fine white primer straight from the rattle can,it can even be decanted into a airbrush, but I also give it a polish with some polishing cloths then finish it with some gloss Tamiya paint sprayed with my airbrush

[TEXANTOMCAT]

I use Rustoleum Plastic White Primer from the rattlecan it is superb - as good as Tamiya and three times as much for the same price!

 

TT

[Gondor44]

Halfords White Plastic Primer here.

 

There are always options....

 

Gondor

[colin]

Mr Surfacer 1500 white with MLT

[Skodadriver]

I build 1/144 civil airliners so spraying white is part of the job description. 

 

I second @Gondor44's recommendation for Halfords white plastic primer. It can be polished up with Micromesh and/or top-coated with Halfords Appliance Gloss White to give whatever finish you need.

 

Dave G

[davecov]

I use enamels and always used to dread painting white as well but nowadays I don't have a problem. My choices are Alclad 2 White Primer and Humbrol H22 Gloss White. There was a time when I didn't like the Humbrol stuff but it seems to have redeemed itself recently and goes on really well.

 

Dave

[holtaa]

No Halford's on this side of the pond (US) - which is too bad as I'd like to give it a go.  After trying everything but Halford's, I prefer to use Zero Paints Primer and White paint.  I won't use anything else.

 

In the UK - https://www.hiroboy.com/Airbrushing_White_PrimerMicro_Filler_30ml--product--13736.html

In the US - http://hobbyworld-usa.com/index.php?controller=search&s=zero+white+primer

Arrin  

[paulsbrown]

 

Has anyone tried the MRP gloss white with the hardener? They seem to get mixed 1/1 ratio.

 

I've been doing a lot of white recently doing prototypes so have been experimenting. Because my prototypes have colorful stripes I have been painting the white in lacquer and the stripes in enamel to ease clean up without dissolving the white base.

 

It's been working as the two projects below show but I have found Tamiya gloss white and Mr Paint gloss white tediously thin (and hard to use as a 'Tipp-ex' like correction)so the suggestions of Tamiya Liquid Surfacer Primer White sounds promising.