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magazine subscriber
Join Date: May 2006
Posts: 423
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Re: stickening
Hi Nat, look at the areas that are actually involved with the needle travel. Any and all of those areas can be effecting the way the trigger action is working (or not working as the case may be).
The needle is new, so we know it's not a bent tip or even the needle as a whole bent into an arch. That may sound funny, but you would be surprised at how often that kind of thing happens.
Is the front end of the brush clean? By that I mean the needle cap, the nozzle cap, and the nozzle itself.
Is the reservoir and the channel at the bottom of the reservoir nice and clean?
When you clean out your airbrush, do you pump the needle?
Pumping the needle is done by filling the reservoir with clean solvent. With the reservoir full of clean solvent, loosen the chucking nut, and pump the needle in and out of the airbrush, it only takes about three quarters of an inch or so of travel. Watch the solvent in the reservoir, If you see it getting cloudy, then it means that there is paint packing up around the needle opening in the collar or needle packing/bearing/seal at the rear of the paint reservoir. This spot is often missed in the typical cleaning routine, but that paint can cause all kinds of problems. If it clouds up, dump the contaminated solvent, and repeat the process until that solvent stays clean and un contaminated.
You are using primarily Createx if I am not mistaken. You can use a good airbrush cleaner like EZ Airbrush Cleaner, or something similar, or if you want to bring out the big guns, go with something like laquer thinner.
I'm not sure I fully understand how clean the trigger area is from your explainations. Backflushing shouldn't really be having any effect on this area.
If you are still seeing paint or debris in this area, then you might try the following:
I would also suggest that you wear some eye protection, this will keep you from getting any splash back in your eyes.
You will need a squirt bottle with solvent in it, I would also have one with plain water in it too.
You may find a denture brush very handy for cleaning and maintaining your brush, if you can't find one, email me your address and I will send you one or two.
Genuine Qtip swabs, and some toothpicks or bamboo skewers.
A clean, soft cloth to wipe down and polish pieces.
Working over a bowl, remove the handle, the chucking nut, the needle chuck, the spring and the adjuster, along with the needle, the trigger, and the auxillary lever/secondary lever. Make sure that all these parts are nice and clean, this includes the openings in the needle chuck, the trigger mast, the secondary lever, the exterior and interior of the needle chuck, the spring, and the interior of the spring adjuster. Any and all of these things can effect how your trigger works.
With those pieces removed, take a good look at the rear end of the brush, are the threads clean and free of ANY paint and debris?
Is there anything on the raised ridge that the needle chuck uses as a guide?
If all those areas appear to be completely clean, go on to the next step. If they aren't completely clean, scrub them until they shine. Use the toothpicks, and denture brush to get at all the hard to get to areas, use the Qtips to give a scrub and wipe down, they also help you see if there is any contamination left. Any paint sticks out like a sore thumb on the pure white of the Qtips.
Once all those areas are clean, hold your airbrush upside down, so that the reservoir on a gravity feed brush were pointing down, or the bottle/cup on a siphon feed brush is pointing up.
Use your squirt bottle of solvent, and soak and rinse out the trigger area. Give it a good dowsing.
Use your denture brush to give the interior walls a good scrubbing, then rinse again. Use your toothpicks, your brush, and your Qtips to get all that muck out. Make sure you keep your airbrush turned upside down when you are doing all this. By holding the brush upside down, you let gravity help you get the junk out, and you keep the debris, paint, and solvents from getting into the airvalve area. That valve and it's seals were never meant to be exposed to paints or solvents. There have been a whole lot of brushes disabled by getting paint, debris or solvents into the airvalve assembly. And those valves are not cheap.
This is kind of like the directions on shampoo, kind of a rinse, lather, rinse type thing. You need to repeat the process until the interior looks like new.
When you can see it is all nice and shiny, do a rinse with the plain water, and do a once over with a clean new Qtip, kind of a white glove test.
Once it is all clean and shiny, you can reassemble your brush. I would use a drop of Aerolube, or even virgin olive oil on the tips of a thumb and index finger, and pull the needle through. ALWAYS pull from the back end of the needle towards the pointy end. This keeps you from getting stabbed or snagged, and it helps you avoid any damage to your needle.
IF everything is clean and straight, then your brush should do just fine.
If you are getting paint coming back through the needle packing/seal or collar if you have an Eclipse or Revolution, then you will be fighting this battle on a regular basis until you change the packing or get a new brush.
To help keep your brush easy to clean, and protect the exterior finish, use a good car wax every time you have to do a full breakdown on the brush. That wax gives a slick finish that will let the water based paints bead up and wipe off easily.
Avoid anything going into your brush that can scratch the chrome or the brass that the body of the airbrush is made of. Lots of people have ruined brushes by using an old needle, or using pipe cleaners to scrape out paint. WHile they might get the paint out, they also scratch through the chrome finish, and tear at the brass. While this may not seem like a big deal, it can make your brush so that it can no longer perform like it should, but it can also give paint places to catch. And if you use things like Windex or ammonia basec cleaners in your brush (A MAJOR BOZO NO NO!), it exposes the brass to the ammonia, and ammonia will corrode the brass, which means that seals and fittings will start losing their ability to do their job correctly.
This all may be more than you really wanted to know, but it should help you with your situation if you do it properly.
Good luck, let me know if you have any questions or problems.
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i bought a new needle too for it,,so no bent needle this time,,any ideas? i had to put a hold on a tshirt request tonight
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