"Undercoat Disaster" Topic

My first attempt at using Army Painter as it's intended is also my first ever use of a white undercoat and my first ever paint failure:

Thirty white uniformed metal 28mm figures, so I sprayed them with a matt white undercoat, namely Motortech brand quick-drying enamel.

The method I've always used with my standard black undercoat system is to lay them out as close as possible to each other on a sheet of newspaper in the shed, spray one side from four directions at an angle, leave them to dry overnight, then do the other side. So, I followed the same sequence with the white paint, but on examining the touch-dry figures after the prescribed drying interval I found they'd come out 'textured', that is, rough and grainy – much more so on the second side done than the first.

I think that any particles on the first side done may be mainly overspray from the second side spraying. Also, because I'm using white and wanted maximum opacity, I decided to do an additional coat per side after waiting the recommended hour.

I've stuck them in a jar of mineral turpentine for now, but I need a permanent fix. Any ideas? It would have to allow for the fact that half of the figures have had head swaps(the new heads are attached with two-part epoxy glue).

weather , warm to very warm day? you sprayed from a bit too far away? sprayed in sunlight? sounds like the paint began to dry before it hit the figures a bit too quick drying perhaps?
The gritty coverage will be well nigh impossible to remove with turpentine..acetone? Isocol?

The temperature's about the same today as when I did the first side yesterday, Cardinal: max around twenty degrees, which I would have considered perfect painting weather.

I sprayed from about the recommended distance of a foot or so, and inside the shed – so no direct sunlight.

The only possible meteorological gremlin might be the wind; the shed doesn't have an internal light so the door has to be open a bit. But I've sprayed on equally windy days with black and never had a problem.

humidity? excessive dust in the air in the shed? An obvious one, but did you shake the can enough?

Was the problem with the undercoat itself? Or did the problem occur after you had a good undercoat & were trying to apply a white Army Painter color?

If the latter, I know that enamel & other kinds of paints may not interact well together. The chemical formulation of the Army Paint may have problem with the enamel. You could try a test to spray the black enamel you have & then the Army Painter white over it, to see if you get the same result.

The climate here is dry, and we've had half the average rainfall this month, BC.

The can had the recommended minute of vigorous shaking.

I do the spraying right next to the shed door, so there's no opportunity for any dust within the shed to be transferred to the figures.

As I said, I was trying out the AP speed-painting technique that relies on the undercoat doubling as the main colour required, so no other paints have yet been applied.

Hello Henry,
I have never used the AP system myself & I know of no one locally which has either, so I can't help you there, but…..
I'm just going to tell of my personal experience, I won't even try to assume to know what happened to your minis as there might be many variables but grain is usually dependant on the paint used , unless fine dust was blown on them whilst still wet ( which is unlikely ). You might try it again on a peice of scrap as already suggested and see what happens.

The best spray undercoat I found is Plasticote Sandable grey primer or red brown one.The Flat white I use,also by Plasticote dries to a satin finish, which is not so good.
After the grey undercoat I airbrush a uniform base coat using Vallejo Air paints, which I must say are excellent.I have also tried out Rowney FW , Magic Colour & Liquitex inks for base coat with very good results.

The best medium I found to remove paint ( any kind ) is Dettol disenfectant ( the brown colour one ).

Hope this helps
Z

This happens to me at times. I think it is a bad spray can. I too follow the same steps as you. I have just painted over the gritty primer and moved on. I am trying to meet a deadline so I don't have the time to strip them.

Your first mistake is using expensive hobby primer. They ALL suck eventually.
Go with the cheapest Walmart spray paint. Forget "primer". Just flat white or flat black is sufficient.

i used the AP spray once with the same result…. not happy….binned the can and went back to cheap car primer.similar prob, IIRC,with a can of GW spay varnish.i really dont wanna talk about that!!!

well for metal figures I always use
I would never use Army Painter in a million years.

White gesso, applied with brush has served me well. Lot cheaper than any of the branded sprays and no nasty fumes.

I have used the cheap Walmart spray cans and this happened to me 3 weeks ago. It really caught me off guard. I have not had this happen to me since I switched over last year.

Recently had a can of expensive black that worked just fine initially, then the second batch 2 weeks later came out slightly gritty. Not enough to worry about unless you look with 3.0 readers.

Yesterday I bought Wal-Mart el-cheepo black and sprayed 108 Prussian Landwehr, no problem.

I had this recently with some GW paint. link

The probable reason was that it was too old and had been sitting under a shed where it had passed some hot summers and, perhaps more relevantly, freezing winters. I'd never had this problem before.

The only issue I had with Wal Marts Valu-cheapo paint is a can that was running very low and was trying to stretch it out before I could get to the store to buy another. That was a bit gritty. But to be fair it was the dregs of the dregs… :)

Damon.

Primed some early Bedouin a couple of weeks ago with the Wal-Mart flat white. Got a bit of roughness on some of the minis but not too bad – they were the camels which were a bit too smooth to begin with…

Had the foot and camels glued to a cardboard with the riders laying on the sheet. Evening was a bit cool with a light intermittent breeze. It was the second time I had used that particular can which was purchased quite recently.

Will have to keep an eye on things when next I use it.

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm delighted to report that despite one side having been left overnight to dry, the offending (and offensive) material was easily removed with the assistance of an old toothbrush after only an hour or so soaking in turps. I think this fact alone says a lot about the quality and durability of the product.

Perhaps foolishly I decided to give the paint the benefit of the doubt and try again this morning. The weather is even better suited to spraying today: only a slight breeze. This time I examined the figures immediately after spraying and, once again, there was the textured effect, so straight into the turps they went.

I'm satisfied that the fault lies entirely with the paint. It may just be a bad can , but I'm not prepared to waste any more time and money finding out. The moral of the story: avoid Motortech quick-drying enamel.

This has cost me some wasted time and the $3.50 USD price of the paint from Cheap As Chips. I'm going to try again with Export brand 'slow' drying enamel and hope I get better results.

yes a 3.50 can probably explains it all.That one I use costs 14.90 oz from Bunnings and never misses a beat.SSLS apparent means Sticks like e

I'm not sure why you have mentioned Army Painter in this thread. As far as I can tell you haven't even used the AP paints yet, but by mentioning AP in this thread you have given some people the impression that their paint is at fault.

I've commented on these boards in the past about plummeting reading comprehension standards. I'll say no more.

Glad to hear the turps worked out.
Best of luck with the next can!

I bought a can of Export brand matt white today, and have just done one side of the figures; smooth and clean, so mission accomplished.

Perhaps the Motortech paint is just too fast-drying for its own good.

I've commented on these boards in the past about plummeting reading comprehension standards. I'll say no more.

Your restraint is commendable.

Follow-up report:

Mission not as accomplished as first hoped.

When the paint finally dried it had a delightful gloss finish (AAAARGH!!!). I just can't win, apparently.

I've seen recommendations on this board that undercoated figures be gloss varnished before applying dips such as Quick Shade, and I'm thinking it might be especially effective with white uniforms. Well, thanks to yet another defective can of paint that decision has been taken out of my hands, but I'm wondering whether to paint the QS over the figures as-is, or matt varnish them first; any opinions (I'll be using Soft Tone)?

I'm with Marshal -- it doesn't look like you're using the Army Painter color primer. But, for anyone reading this thread, AP has a tutorial on how to use it. FOLLOW IT. With large numbers of miniatures to paint, I like to use the AP color primers as the last color in zenithal priming. Saves a fair amount of time painting.