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No matter what I try, I keep getting build up on paint on the very tip of the needle. At first I though it might be how thick the paint is, but I am using D&R inks, so I am not sure how much thinner I can get. It happens with Model Air paints too. I lowered the air pressure. I use needle juice after every cleaning. Still I get the build up. I am using a Badger Renegade Velocity with the ultra fine needle.

Any ideas what I am doing wrong? Or is this just a fact of life and I need to get a qtip out every so often and try and clean this off?

Tip dry is inevitable, you don't give any sort of timescales as to when this occurs to say whether its nor al or no, but if you have to stop every few minutes to clean, I wouldn't worry.

I keep a cotton bud and some airbrush cleaner to hand and give it a clean every so often, prevention being better than cure, seems to do the trick.

ok, will give that a whirl. One more thing to pay attention to.

If your paint is drying up this means your paint is more than likely too thick. Your paint should look about the same as milk in a glass. Kinda merky but see through.

Also, use windex not water, water has a habbit of not absorbing into the paint. It wants to seperate the paint molecules away from the water which will gunk up your brush.

Clean your air brush daily, you dont have to break it down all the way; but run air brush cleaners through it and then water before each use.

If there is anything else let me know.

1) The tip build up even happens with ink, which is what I have been using almost entirely of late. So I doubt I need to thin that more since it is already thinner than airbrush paints I have used, Model Air, Golden, etc. The ink works really well too.

2) When I do thin paint, I use Golden airbrush medium instead. I figured I would use something made for the job. That works well too. For the most part though I use only airbrush paint in my airbrush. Thinning paints is frustrating and for the limited times I have to paint, frustration and inconsistent results are a pain. So 99% of the time I pay the extra money and just use paint and ink that are meant for airbrushing when I use my airbrush.

3) I clean it after every use by breaking it down almost entirely and putting it in an ultrasonic cleaner.

The best way I've found to combat dry tip was to use drying retarder. I only have to take 10 seconds to pinch a tissue over the tip of the needle (Badger Krome) every 5-10 mins if I'm on the same colour. If I'm changing colours frequently, the windex after each colour change keeps it fine. I've been meaning to get some airbrush lube to try that too/instead but this works well for me.

 Synchro wrote:
3) I clean it after every use by breaking it down almost entirely and putting it in an ultrasonic cleaner.

This is overkill, and if you put more than the needle and nozzle in the US cleaner probably more damaging than anythinig else (source Badger Airbrush).

Actually I even windex my inks. They tend to be thick even for washes.

Tip dry is just part of airbrushing acrylics Im afraid.
Acrylic paints dry vry very fast, and when you add a huge amount of dry air rushing through it some will dry.
It can be reduced (but not gotten rid of) with appropriate thinning, I like to use Liquitex Airbrushing Medium mixed with my paint, no water, or windex or ipa etc.

Removing it is something your'e going to have to learn
As said above a cotton bud with some cleaner on can do it, I tend to use the needle guard to gently scrap it away. Whatever you do be careful and light handed as once its bent it needs replacing.

I use a 0.3 and I don't get to much clogging.
It's always better to airbrush in a cooler environment I find running some water or airbrush thinner threw the airbrush before putting paint into the cup seems to help reason for that is, if you have a VMA for example but it's a little dry and you press it to test it. It is now down in there.. and will clog abit.

Make sure it's very thin... but like many have said already indeed it's a part of airbrushing, kinda like how your paint will dry on your brush.

another thing can be turning your PSI up really high when its clogging and doing a very high burst to get any gunk blocking the tip.. Try and stay away from the tip as much as you can! can very easily break trust me i've been threw about 3 over my time of airbrushing :(

try and do smaller amounts of painting sessions. Don't fill the cup all the way up... inks/paint w/e all the same.

after about 5 or so mins put some water threw it, clean cup with a tissue than run some airbrush cleaner threw it get it all nice and fresh and go again.


hope this helpd Good luck mate its mainly trial and error.