Do you spray, or brush on primer?

[Eryops]

I\'ve had okay experiences with spraying primer, and also pretty crummy ones. I\'ve recently started brushing primer on, to much better effects. So I\'d like to pose the question:

Do YOU use a spray can, or do you brush your primer on?

FYI I\'ve used GW\'s spray primer, and Vallejo\'s primer in the drop bottle (brush on).

 

[sg2009]

personally i prefer using spray, but thats because i haven\'t really tried any brush on primers. Also i think it comes down to personal opinion


sam

 

[freakinacage]

i use halfords own brand grey spray. it\'s smoother than gw and proportionally cheaper. also the grey is nice to work on as you can still get nice dark colours easily on it but also light colours take well

 

[GobboTeef]

i use spray. I find you get a more even coverage with the coat and the paint tends to adhere better. However it\'s just personal preference and I\'m too lazy to spend time painting it on! :yawn:

 

[Davyboy74]

Im an old school brush-on primer type

 

[Einion]

I spray primer 98% of the time (acrylic automotive type). I brush-prime every now and then for small areas or where I don\'t want to bother with masking before spraying.

My main reservations about brush primers is that, of the ones I\'ve tried, they\'re never very tough and I\'ve had ruboff far too often to rely on them.

Einion

 

[generulpoleaxe]

for 30mm minis i generaly use a few quick squirts of gw\'s white spray (if put on realy thin so that it looks grey it works a treat, if you put enough on for it to look white it\'s a bit poo)

for larger minis i airbrush them with a primer.

 

[DaRat]

These days, I mostly use a brush on primer, but applied with an airbrush.

I sometimes till use an automotive primer (Duplicolor Sandable Primer) and then touch up with the brush on primer.

 

[Naukhel]

For me, it depends on the weather, outside. I spray if it\'s nice out, and if it\'s
raining, I use brush-on.

 

[Gilvan Blight]

This should have been a poll.

I use spray on primer, touched up with a bit of brush on for those hard to reach places. I also swap between white and black depending on what I am painting but mostly use black. I used to use grey, but have since polarized my preferance.

 

[Wren]

I use brush-on almost exclusively. I got tired of having to wait on the weather to prime. I tend to work on a mini at a time not do batches of prepping and priming. For me the brush-on is also a last level of prep quality control. If I find a missed mould line or what-have-you while I\'m priming I fix it and go back to priming.

I use Reaper Master Series primer, which comes in both black and white. I\'ve also used Derivan MiNiS primer, back before RMS came in black and liked it fine. (It\'s just harder for me to get.)

 

[Ritual]

How well does Reaper Master Series primer adher to the mini? I sometimes use VMC primer and it has a tendency to peel off (like Einion mentioned) when applying the first coat of paint. Except for this annoyance, I like brush-on (applied through airbrush) because it gives you a smoother surface to work on.

 

[james sequeira]

Spray on, I havnt really had to be held back because of the weather over here.

 

[generulpoleaxe]

ritual, the game colour primer has better adherance than the model colour primer.

 

[Ritual]

Originally posted by generulpoleaxe
ritual, the game colour primer has better adherance than the model colour primer.

Thanks! I\'ll give it a try then! :beer:

 

[Wren]

I don\'t think brush on primer adheres quite as strongly as spray primer, or at least spray enamel which I believe actually etches into the metal a little.

But I don\'t have massive rub-off problems with the RMS primer. It\'ll rub off around the rim of the base a little and on high points like hair curls or something else that sticks out a lot or gets rubbed while I\'m painting, but I\'ve never had it peel off while applying paint. And if I do all my base coats first then I don\'t even get the handling rub off while painting except on the occasional very sharp/pointy part.

The RMS primer is not prone to peeling in general. I quite frequently scratch off a piece of dust or hair or whatever that got under the primer and it\'ll usually just scratch off that one tiny spot. One of the spray primers I tried, while it gave a really nice surface, would peel off until it got to an edge when I did that, and it also seemed kind of brittle, it cracked when I bent something into place and I\'ve never had that happen with any other kind of before.

 

[demonherald]

@ Anders the reaper isn\'t too bad.I find it better than VMC but have to admit I haven\'t tried VGC.The only problem I\'ve really had is it can be a tad shiny but I thik that\'s been ore down to another problem rather than the pant itself. I generally use brush on for comp pieces and bits where I\'m taking my time a little but the amount of minis I\'m bloody painting a lately I use sprays...

@Anders and Generulepoleaxe what Airbrush and water: paint ratio do you use???

 

[Eryops]

Originally posted by Gilvan Blight
This should have been a poll.

Once I figure out that mechanism, I\'ll do it (I click the \'start a poll\' button, and it just brings me to the regular \'start a new thread\' page)

Here\'s a thought comparing the strength of spray to brush-on primer: Do people typically spray prime batches of minis, which can sit for weeks without getting painted vs. someone who does a mini at a time (brush priming and painting) where the primer may not have as long to cure?

Of course there could be (and most likely is) chemical differences between the two...

 

[mattsterbenz]

I use spray primer all the time. I like GW white, and the new Chaos Black isn\'t half bad either.

I found some good cheap black spray, and I used that before GW came out with the new improved black primer. It was from Wal Mart stores, $1 a can. Brand name is \"Colorplace\". Awesome bargain.

-Matt

 

[digbaddy72]

I use spray primer all the time. But then I need to go back over parts with a brush to hit the areas the spray didnt get to.