Air brushing / Spray painting small parts

[Silkjc]

Hello all,

I've just started to use my airbrush for most parts I make...and quickly ran into a problem I am sure many of you have faced. When attempting to spray paint small parts, the pressure from the gun simply blows the parts away! My solution is simple, and i'm sure many of you have thought of this before...but elegant enough that I thought it might warrant sharing. 

 

Double sided tape the part down using its normal mating surface

 

So what other methods do you all have of arresting small / tiny parts such that they do not decide to go orbital instead of putting on their makeup?

 

[genericDave]

I do all the painting I can with an airbrush (I'm horrible at hand painting), and I've run into the same problem.   I use the tape method you described many times.

 

Another technique I use quite a bit is to drill a small hole in the bottom of the piece and glue in some thin brass rod.  I leave the rod long, and use that to hold the piece during painting.  Once painting is done, I trim the rod down.  Often I leave a little bit of the rod and use it as a 'post' to help secure the piece more firmly on the ship.  I also have a few small pieces (4x6 inches) of that generic white acoustic ceiling tile you find in a lot of offices - it makes a great board to stick pieces into during painting.  (The brass rod I glue onto the piece kinda acts like a push-pin.). I bought one ceiling tile at a hardware store several years ago for under $5 and have just been cutting small pieces off as needed.

 

I normally flip the ceiling tile over and use the unfinished 'back', and lay some wax paper over it.

[wefalck]

I tend to put the pins into corks from Sherry- or Port-bottles, the ones with the plastic lid, that stand safely on the bench. You can pick them up and turn them around for spray-painting etc.

[Nirvana]

On ‎3‎/‎14‎/‎2017 at 5:25 AM, Silkjc said:

Hello all,

I've just started to use my airbrush for most parts I make...and quickly ran into a problem I am sure many of you have faced. When attempting to spray paint small parts, the pressure from the gun simply blows the parts away! My solution is simple, and i'm sure many of you have thought of this before...but elegant enough that I thought it might warrant sharing. 

 

Double sided tape the part down using its normal mating surface

 

So what other methods do you all have of arresting small / tiny parts such that they do not decide to go orbital instead of putting on their makeup?

 

The double sided for small parts is working for me very well, even for brush painting.

[GuntherMT]

You can also use blue-tac to hold small parts while painting.

[EDD W]

Get a sheet or block of foam/stiff sponge/polystyrene, cut of the tip of a cocktail stick and put a small ball of Gorilla Tack on the end.

pick up the item to be painted with the gorilla Tack and place it upright into the foam/styrene base. Now you can paint the part by hand or spray.

When dry remove part and turn over (the gorilla tack will not leave a mark), then paint second side. the cocktail sticks and balls of tack can be used again and again.