Fellow hobbyists, I have been a fan of The Army Painter's brushes and their colored spray primers for some years now. I know there are better and worse alternatives for each, however, they work for me. Typically, I keep my spray primers on a shelf in the garage and have had no ill effects until yesterday (August 6th, 2020). I have their white, black, demonic yellow (Imperial Fists shortcut), Desert yellow, and pure red. I cracked out the Pure Red about 3pm, 85 degrees F, with 64% humidity. Now, I have primed year round here. The Pure Red is a new color for me and I was priming some Royal Imperial Guards for Star Wars Legion. Oh, I have also sprayed the other colors thin, sometimes too thick, and have had solid results. Here's my Red:
Nope. Ok. A little heavy on the trigger this time, and sprayed about 6-8 inches away from the model, but have done that before with no real ill effects. Let me try that again.... same result mini #2. I posted my errors on the Paint Hub for War-games and Miniatures Facebook page. Fantastic tips, advice, empathy, hilarious memes, etc... ensued. I do want to mention that this is a great community page.
After conversing with some people on the page, I did the following to try to improve my results. (I have 2 more models from this kit to screw up, so why not?) This time, I set the primer can in a mixing bowl, turned on the tap on hot, waited until hot water was coming out, filled the bowl, and left the tap running over the can for about 5 minutes. Then, I reshook the can for a solid 3 minutes...rule of thumb is 2 minutes, so I went on a little longer. Took the 3rd model outside, still 81F with 74% humidity, this time I sprayed about 10-12 inches and made sure not to go heavy on the paint. Result #3:
Better! Still not results I'm used to. Grainy. This time the consensus was the paint was drying before it hit the model. Model #3 in the Simple Green bath too.
I stopped to think for a bit and well, decided that I would do what I typically do when I paint Imperial Fists with the Demonic Yellow Primer. Prime with white first, then use the yellow as a spray paint base coat. Grabbed the 4th model and primed it white like I have numerous other models before with that can of spray primer. I didn't take a pic of that model, but it was even better than the one pictured directly above, still a bit grainy. At this point, I chalked it up to a bad day of priming environment, with a possibly bad can of Pure Red. Currently, all 4 are hanging out in the Simple Green bath.
Put them in around 3pm on a Thursday, gonna let 'em soak until I get 99% Isopropyl Alcohol in from Amazon on Saturday. Then it's a strip down and try again. I'll update myself and anyone else who finds interest in following along. Oh and I want to mention again, if you aren't part of the Paint Hub for War-games and Miniatures page on Facebook, it's a great group hobby group.
So, to begin stripping, they sat in the Simple Green overnight. The Force Pikes became a little extra pliable, but as they stayed out of the bath, they stiffened back up. (Same is true for the Isopropyl Alcohol 99%.) No real progress with the Simple Green, so I started a 99% Isopropyl Alcohol soak. I would leave them in for about 30 minutes, pull one out, scrub with a toothbrush, scrub with a q-tip soaked in the the alcohol, rinse, let them dry, do it again. I kept doing it off and on throughout a couple of days. Here is the final result.
(I will work on the one I primed white again to get more off, but I'm about done.) Now, just to wait for a less humid day and try again.
