Homemade Bottles of Wash

[Joe Kutz]

From my own tests with the RMS paints and a custom extender mix that I use for making glazes...diethylene glycol ethyl ether reacts with something in the RMS base (not sure what).

 

Both diethylene glycol ethyl ether and tributoxy ethyl phosphate are used as thinners for the acrylic...and normally are benign with paints. BTW - the tributoxy ethyl phosphate is what reacts to make the phosphine gas...so be careful if you use Future with airbrush paints (very popular with numerous tutorials on airbrushing) and later clean the brush with various cleaners (including Windex). Although the volume of gas created is relatively small - it is very flammable and very deadly.

[Olaf the Stout]

Hi all,

 

I'm new here. I'm looking at making a "magic wash" mix. I have heard that a lot of people use Future floor polish. However, regardless of whether it is safe or not, it isn't available here in Australia. So I am wondering what to add to my inks so that they flow into the recesses like the "magic wash" does.

 

Should I use flow improver or something else?

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Olaf the Stout

[Joe Kutz]

You should be able to get a hold of one of the various glycol ethers (propylene glycol, ethylene glycol, polyethylene glycol) which are often used for that purpose. Depending on where in Australia you are at - they are available in several different acrylic thinners, as wood preservatives or as a veterinarian supply to treat a variety of digestive problems with sheep, goats and cows. They will all increase the flow of acrylics and other similar paints - as well as work as a thinner/water substitute. Depending on the specific nature of the base, certain ones do perform better than others though.

 

You can also use artist's flow improvers. There are several which are available on the market from companies like Liquitex and Winsor & Newton. These are often the safer option...though just because it works with one brand of paint is no guarantee that it will yield the same results with a different brand of paint (or even a different line from the same manufacturer).

 

However, you specifically say inks...which may very well change everything. Are you talking about ink ink - or watered down paint ink?

 

One last thing...in Australia - Future is called Pledge "One Go".

[Olaf the Stout]

You should be able to get a hold of one of the various glycol ethers (propylene glycol, ethylene glycol, polyethylene glycol) which are often used for that purpose. Depending on where in Australia you are at - they are available in several different acrylic thinners, as wood preservatives or as a veterinarian supply to treat a variety of digestive problems with sheep, goats and cows. They will all increase the flow of acrylics and other similar paints - as well as work as a thinner/water substitute. Depending on the specific nature of the base, certain ones do perform better than others though.

 

You can also use artist's flow improvers. There are several which are available on the market from companies like Liquitex and Winsor & Newton. These are often the safer option...though just because it works with one brand of paint is no guarantee that it will yield the same results with a different brand of paint (or even a different line from the same manufacturer).

 

However, you specifically say inks...which may very well change everything. Are you talking about ink ink - or watered down paint ink?

 

One last thing...in Australia - Future is called Pledge "One Go".

 

I'm talking about ink inks. More specifically, Games Workshop inks. I believe that they are actually made by Windsor and Newton. Therefore I was thinking that W&N Flow Improver would be the best product to use for them. However I wanted to be sure that Flow Improver was actually the product that I wanted before I spent AUD$20 on buying a bottle of it.

 

Olaf the Stout

[Joe Kutz]

The new GW inks are no longer inks - rather paints. The old GW inks were more like an ink than a paint. You will want to go with a flow improver for normal acrylics for the new ones. From what I have seen - they do resemble the W&N washes very closely...however that might just be what was used to prototype the new inks as opposed to actually contracting out the development with W&N. The One Go will work just like Future does for us in North America. You might consider using an ink base or extender. It is kind of like a normal acrylic medium, only much thinner...almost like water. They behave a lot like Future - but they don't have the same thinners (which cause issue from time to time).

 

Normally real inks do not require anything to make them flow. The nature of the ink is to flow (from technical pens and nibs...). The Bombay inks which I use a lot will flow tightly along creases and folds avoiding flat spots. Very easy to control - but very different than a wash.

[Olaf the Stout]

Just to be totally clear, I am talking about the Games Workshop inks which were recently discontinued. I am not talking about the new range of paint washes that they have brought out.

 

Does this make a difference to what you said in your last post?

 

Olaf the Stout

[Rastl]

I'm firmly in the 'no more floor wax in the paints' camp.

 

You can get matte varnish or glaze medium by the acrylic craft paints in pretty much any store that sells craft paints. Either one will work very well to make Magic Wash.

 

As stated earlier, the ratio is 3:3:1 glaze/varnish:water:paint/ink/liner.

 

These products are formulated to work with acrylic paints. So use them!

 

This mix will make a wash that flows into the crevices, stays off the high points and generally behaves itself.

[vutpakdi]

I use matte medium or matte varnish in my washes.

 

I've played just a bit with the GW paints. Not enough to form much of an opinion, though I still suspect that they are essentially just fairly transparent paints in matte medium.

 

So far, they seem a bit more viscous than my normal wash mix (and therefore are a bit more likely to stay where they are rather than run), but I think that I could duplicate that effect by upping the portion of matte medium to water.

 

Ron

[Vaitalla]

Oh, Future may not be toxic in a carcinogenic kind of way, but it's still nothing I want in my paint as a proven brush-licker (reportedly tastes AWFUL!). Weird that some of Future's ingredients are on a few states' Right-to-Know Hazardous Substances lists, but not super-paranoid California. Go figure!

 

At any rate, yes Future or Matte Medium or for that matter Gloss Medium or Reaper Brush-On Sealer will all work to make your washes more transparent, except that as Joe says, Future doth not like MSP's. Don't know about Pro Paints, haven't tried it with them.

 

--Anne

 

For reference (and in support of Joe's point), here's an MSDS for Future Premium Floor Finish. The MSDS lists the ingredients.

 

Of course, now I'm wondering why the MSPs don't work with Future.

[Joe Kutz]

Weird that some of Future's ingredients are on a few states' Right-to-Know Hazardous Substances lists, but not super-paranoid California.

 

Most of those lists are compiled by politicians and activists who failed high school chemistry and assume that anything other than bean sprouts is dangerous for you. I take them with slightly less than half a grain of salt.

 

Tributoxy ethyl phosphate is probably in everything that you have eaten in the last 15 years (it is a substitute plasticizer for many of those which the loons have already had banned). As a result, it ends up in any food which is packaged in plastic.

 

Diethylene glycol ethyl ether is a little less common, and in concentrated forms is a skin irritant - but other than that...still all good. However it is hazardous to cats. However, people are not cats - and do not metabolize chemicals like cats. There have been several cases where people drink it to get drunk (usually the down and dirty alcoholic types). In most cases the person suffers the same effects as normal alcohol...not saying no one has ever died from drinking it - however one can not say that ethanol (the chemical of choice for most alcoholics and social drinkers) is that safe either (which is also a skin irritant).

[Olaf the Stout]

So something like this product is what I need to make my inks stay off the high areas and flow into the crevices? What about this product instead? What is the difference between Matt Medium and Flow Improver?

 

And I take it that the same product will work in exactly the same for paint washes as it does for ink washes?

 

Olaf the Stout

[Joe Kutz]

Sorry about that...

 

Since you are using the old GW inks and not the new GW washes - you may need to use something more like a Tamiya thinner or Polyscale thinner. Since most ink bases do not behave well with water (non-miscible), you will get better results with an alcohol thinner than a water thinner. The alcohol also functions as a flow improver - so no additional need for that.

 

You can go through with water as your thinner, but the ink will have a tendency to separate from the water fairly fast. You will also need to use an additional additive to overcome water's fairly significant surface tension...so the alcohol based thinners just seem to be the better option.

[Olaf the Stout]

Sorry about that...

 

Since you are using the old GW inks and not the new GW washes - you may need to use something more like a Tamiya thinner or Polyscale thinner. Since most ink bases do not behave well with water (non-miscible), you will get better results with an alcohol thinner than a water thinner. The alcohol also functions as a flow improver - so no additional need for that.

 

You can go through with water as your thinner, but the ink will have a tendency to separate from the water fairly fast. You will also need to use an additional additive to overcome water's fairly significant surface tension...so the alcohol based thinners just seem to be the better option.

 

 

So either of the W&N products I suggested in the post above won't work well with the GW/W&N inks to help the inks stay of the high spots and run into the crevices?

 

I have tried using water as my thinner for the inks. It didn't really seem to help the ink run into the crevices. All it really did was reduce the colour intensity of the ink (which isn't really a big surprise).

 

I figured something like Flow Improver would reduce the surface tension of the ink so that it would flow into the crevices.

 

Olaf the Stout

[Joe Kutz]

So either of the W&N products I suggested in the post above won't work well with the GW/W&N inks to help the inks stay of the high spots and run into the crevices?

 

My experience with the GW inks indicate that they are not quite the same as the W&N inks in terms of base and consistency.

 

As I mentioned - alcohol is the key...isopropol will work well enough to see if you like what happens. Use about 1 drop of alcohol to 2 or 3 drops of ink.

[psyberwolfe1]

I know the answer to this one!!! Liquid Hand soap, or liquid pink soap found in most hobby/ art stores. I use it all the time to thin my GW ink. Works Great!!! 1 drop liquid soap to any quantity ink plus water. The only draw back is that you will have to spray clear coat it if you want to paint on top because sometimes if there is too high a concentration of soap then the wash/ glaze will become liquid again with the addition of any water.