Water Pick?

[turelhim vampire]

Hey guys,

 

I've heard that when stripping paint you can use a water pick instead of a toothbrush to remove the old paint from a model once its done in the paint stripper.

 

Does anyone have any experience with these tools and how well it works?

 

Cheers,

 

Vamp

[target6584]

That actually sounds like a really good idea. I've got a water pick and a few minis in stripper so I'll let you know how it works.

 

 

* Ok seems to work fairly well, but water and paint chips get everywhere. Although the paint does come off in larger chips and doesn't seem as messy as it can be when scrubbing with a toothbrush.

 

** Ok well I've tried a few more times on other minis and while it does work, it doesn't seem as fast as with a brush. It also takes a lot of water as I was constantly having to refill the reservoir. Also water gets everywhere, with all the odd angles on the minis you really can't help but get wet. I was doing it in a bucket and I was still getting water in the face. Seems like it would be best to first go over the part with a brush then use the water pick to get into the hard to reach places.

 

Hope this helps some.

[Brother Captain Joe]

It works but it makes a mess, I seriously blasted bits of paint all over.

My recommendation is to use an old tooth brush for most of the mini and then use the water pick for crevasses you just can’t get with the tooth brush.

I just let a mini sit in simple-green several hours until the pain starts to blister a bit then a toothbrush under warm water makes the paint come off like magic.

If you have a heavy coat of varnish on the mini then you just need to let it sit in the simple-green longer, and then the deeper spots need a water pick or tooth pick to dig the paint out.

[Centerfire]

I went ahead and tried this out for myself, and had much the same experience as the other posters. It works, but it makes a freaking huge mess if you try it on a mini that's fresh out of the Simple Green -- you end up spraying clots of paint all of your sink. If you clean off most of the paint with a nylon toothbrush first, and reserve the waterpik for hard-to-reach places, then you'll have better luck.

 

Thing is, though, there are other, much cheaper ways to clean paint out of those hard-to-reach places. Scalecoat Washaway plus mini nylon brushes from a smallbore gun or airbrush cleaning kit will usually do the job. So I wouldn't run out and drop $50 or $70 on a brand-new waterpik just for this. If, on the other hand, you have a seldom-used waterpik just laying around...

[ShinyRhino]

Have you water-pickers tried submerging the mini in a sink full of water? That's how I scrub my stuff with a toothbrush. I fill the sink with water, and scrub with my hands in the water, so paint and SG don't spray all over my bathroom.

The water pick should still have enough pressure to be able to clean out small areas while underwater, and it won't make a huge mess.

[Centerfire]

Have you water-pickers tried submerging the mini in a sink full of water?

 

Got around to trying this last night. Much less messy than spraying above water, but you really have to crank the pressure on the Waterpik to make it work -- way higher than you'd ever use on your teeth. :lol: