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So recently I am planning on painting some Reaper Bones figures, and despite what some people have said, I don't trust the ability to paint right on the bare figure. I am planning on using a brush on primer as I have heard negative reactions to sprays on Bones figures.

Does anyone have any first-hand advise on brush-on primers vs. others? Everything I have turned up on Youtube has people saying that Vallejo brush on Surface Primer is the best for durability on Bones, but all I could find locally was the Brush-On Primer made by Army Painter. Has anyone used it with success?

Apparently the Reaper ‘brown liner’ works best as a brush on for Bones.
As long as the primer is non-reactive, it should be fine, regardless of brand. Try it on a small area on the base, or bottom of the feet just to make sure.

I ended up painting a small cheap model with it and I'll wait to paint the rest until I see if it works out. I just know I have seen videos where the Vallejo primer is rock hard versus scrapes, even on heavy textures, but as I had already bought a bottle of the Armypainter before I saw those videos (Murphy's Law, of course), I'm hoping it'll work out.

But if anyone can steer me in a better direction, I welcome the info.

Bones plastic is soft and bendy and really has a hard time chipping or having paint flake off, simply due to the nature of the material.
I think it has less to do with the primer, and more to do with what they’re made of.

Well, lots of reviews I have been reading say that unless prepped with a good brush-on primer, lots of acrylic paints that are applied right onto Bones are easily flaked/scratched off. Especially with the early white Bones (which two of the models I need to paint are), before they started making them in the less-bendy grey plastic.

Frankly I have a couple of Bones Black models, and so far THAT material is better in every possible way (pretty close to HIPS plastic, or at least Restic) but I still wouldn't trust it at all without a primer underneath, after 25 years of painting metals and plastics I just don't trust it.

I've brushed on the Vallejo Dark German Grey, dark red, yellow (oche), bone, and white. The bone and white had the weirdest problem, I'd get tons of little bubbles all over the surface into the cracks when brushing on. They didn't pop as they dried, I was trying to prime some Deathwing and some dryads to look like birch with white and they've got little bubbles in the recesses. I shook the hell out of it, let it sit, and tried thinning it with water or straight out of the bottle. The primer on my palatte would be fine, it was like the action of the brush would cause it to foam which was weird.

The dark German grey, dark red, and oche went on fine but the oche didn't cover great on the first coat. You don't always need perfect coverage with primer so I started putting Averland Sunset over it and it came out okay. The dark grey had the best coverage, no bubbles, and paint sticks to the surface okay but that'll be less helpful for lighter colors.

I actually ended up purchasing a bottle of Vallejo Surface Primer (grey, like I always spray prime) from Amazon to test how it works for myself, as none of the shops around me that carry hobby paint had it. After leaving the test model that I primed with Army Painter Brush-On Primer for 24 hours, I was still able to easily use my fingernail to scratch the primer right off to show the white Bones underneath, so that's not going to work.

When the Surface Primer comes, I will also try the additional Bones pre-primer step of washing the models first in 91% Iso Alchohol as several videos have suggested. I always wash my models in Dish Detergent or Simple Green, but have heard that Alcohol is a good second wash step for bare Bones, with some people even saying it's like it almost "dries" out the topmost layer of the material and helps brush-on Primer adhere better.

Vallejo primer brushed on passes the fingernail test on most of my models, even FW resin. Hell I tried to strip some minis I primed with it so I could respray them white for contrast paints and I had to soak them in 91% alcohol to get the bloody primer off.

Dunno what your weather patterns are like but in the winter it's too cold in VA where I am to spray (goes on too wet) and it's waaaaay too humid to reliably prime in the summer so I started brushing on Vallejo. It is really freaking boring doing a whole army though, that's for sure!

I'm in Michigan so it's too cold in the winter to spray anywhere but my basement. Hell, I lucked out this week in that I can even have paint shipped to me at all- usually it'll freeze and be ruined in the winter before I can get to the package if it's left while I am at work (but this year I am on vacation to accept the delivery AND it's in the 40's).

I'll have to see if brush-on will be the thing for me on anything other than Bones (though even that makes Bones even a possibility for models, so there's that). I'm still a stickler for spray primers on metals and HIPS, even if I have to do it in the basement and give it 48+hrs to cure (and that's even with a dehumidifier set to 45%). But if it works....maybe it can change things. Lately I am playing skirmish games, so the lack of speed priming is not to crazy a downside.