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Well, long story short, I let my impatience get the best of me and tried to prime in high humidity ...at first glance the models looked ok, but after a few passes the gritty texture started to show. I got them inside right away in a cool area and they aren't terrible, but it's there for sure.

A couple ideas have run through my mind, from trying to get the texture down with a toothbrush and doing another light priming when humidity is better to just hoping the thinned paint will even out the texture a bit.

Do any of you guys have any experience coming back from this kind of issue or should I just dump them in the simple green while the paint is still soft? My main concern is the sergeant has a handful of conversions and I would like to avoid the glue coming apart if I can...but if I have to, I have to.

What did you prime them with? Did you leave them outside after you sprayed them? Also, what kind of glue did you use?

It is very, very unlikely that paint will cover a gritty texture. If you want to strip them, try Super Clean. I have found it much better than Simple Green.

I've primed in 90something humid weather, then immediately brought the models back inside to air conditioning, and they've been fine. You may have either been too slow, or just had a bad can of primer. Alternately, it just might not have been shaken up enough, or you sprayed too far from the model. I know Army Painter sprays can fuzz pretty badly if you're some distance away from your target.

I'd just strip them. The sooner they start soaking, the faster you can get them out of the stuff (partial cure, as you know) to preserve your potentially vulnerable glue joins. Unless you're sanding between coats, which is more than a little impractical at this scale, throwing more paint at the problem won't make it go away, until the point that you've practically drowned the model and lost all surface detail, wanted or not. Unfortunate, but not the end of the world.

It's always best to avoid as much humidity as you can, but SRM brings up a point that often gets drowned out by the chorus of "shake more" and "warm the can" (both are generally good practice, of course) - spray distance. Moving closer to the models gives the atomized paint less time to be affected by ambient conditions before it hits the model, as well as ensuring that the paint that lands has plenty of solvent still in it, allowing it to self-level more effectively. Excessive dryness and heat can cause chalky finishes that are equally problematic, but shorter spray distances also help in that case, for the same reasons. Just be sure to move fast, as the more concentrated cone of spray makes it easy to overload a model.

I do most of my spraying at roughly 6" and I've yet to have an aerosol job go bad, even though I only avoid the very worst of weather.

Thanks for the replies folks, I bit the bullet and tossed them in the stripper shortly after posting...why mess around right? It is army painter color primer, but I've used three cans of the stuff before and prior read about it needing to be a little closer than most other primers and that's how I do it. A different color that I did as a test mini also did the same thing. Well, thanks again for replying! Be safe and keep on gaming!

I live in Florida were the humidity stays at rediculous levels most days and the days it's not humid it's raining. I feel your pain. I have to paint model according to the weather. lol

Due to living near a stream (it's behind the back porch), we've picked up a can of Black Gesso to be able to prime by hand. It's not bad and the models we've painted after primering this method have come out pretty well. Liquitex makes it, as do other companies, and you can get it online or at most craft stores.

When it's not humid, I've used DupiColor Sandable primer. This has helped during humidity spikes (that I didn't detect) as when the primer did start to wrinkle up a bit, I could take a 1000 grain sheet of sandpaper and sand it smooth again. A touch of black paint on the corners where a little plastic came through after the sanding and it looked as good as a fresh primer job (the only difference is sanded primer has a duller sheen to it).

The next step was to get a humidity gauge and it sits on the table outside and if it says 60% or higher, we pick up the gesso.

The airbrush will prime them, a bit slower, but just fine in humid weather.

 Gunzhard wrote:
The airbrush will prime them, a bit slower, but just fine in humid weather.

Yeah...I'm waiting on my security deposit from my apartment to get to me so I can pick up an air brush and compressor. Should be here any day now!

 Gunzhard wrote:
The airbrush will prime them, a bit slower, but just fine in humid weather.

I've had issues with primer jamming up my airbrush, but then again I abuse the heck out of the thing

 Brother SRM wrote:
I've primed in 90something humid weather, then immediately brought the models back inside to air conditioning, and they've been fine. You may have either been too slow, or just had a bad can of primer. Alternately, it just might not have been shaken up enough, or you sprayed too far from the model. I know Army Painter sprays can fuzz pretty badly if you're some distance away from your target.

just stripped my fw squig gobba because of this reason, TWICE!

I thought spraying in my garage was the problem (which was a contributing factor I believe), but then took gobba outside and was still too far way and resulted in me needing to strip a 2nd time...



note: still haven't re-primed him.

 Grundz wrote:

 Gunzhard wrote:
The airbrush will prime them, a bit slower, but just fine in humid weather.

I've had issues with primer jamming up my airbrush, but then again I abuse the heck out of the thing

Yeah it could happen if the paint is too thick; but I prime ALL of my models that way... works great.