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VIDEO

Cleaning Your Spray Gun

HOW TO MAINTAIN YOUR SPRAY GUN
"Poor painting results are frequently the result of badly maintained or used spray guns."

Like every tool, it is important take the time and properly maintain your tool. A spray gun is actually a very delicate piece of machinery and any scratches, dents, dirt or otherwise in the cap or tip can create a problem. The appropriate maintenance is very important to the life and health of your gun as well as your sanity in creating a flawless finish.

Where paint spray guns have been poorly maintained and neglected, it is easy to imagine that that a poor tool will produce a bad paint job. There is no need for things to get bad. There are many things a painter can do to increase reliability of their spray gun.

Cleaning and Care

To ensure a long service life and that the tool retains its function, ToolParadise recommends your spray gun be given certain basic care and be regularly cleaned and lubricated. The following “maintenance intervals“ have proven successful for this:

For Professional and frequent painters • After each paint job or before each change in colour or material • “Routine cleaning“ - Several times a week, depending on the material used and the degree of soiling. • “Thorough cleaning “ - At least once a week

• For “infrequent painters“ • Most important - before your store your item for a break or any long length of time. • The respective “extent of maintenance“ depends on the operating conditions:   1. Fill material pot or cup with suitable cleaning agent.   2. Start up spray gun without pressure and allow the solvent to run through.   3. Repeat the flushing procedure until the cleaning agent is clear when exiting.   4. Clean the outside of the spray gun using a cloth soaked in solvent.   5. Never "Soak" your gun.

• Special brush is used to remove paint residues stuck to the drill holes (in the picture of the paint duct). Special cleaning needles are available for finishing off the smaller drill holes. But careful: Backing up! Do not simply push the paint residues back into the openings!
When changing the nozzle set you should always install the complete set consisting of an air cap, paint nozzle and paint pin. Here you must follow the installation regulations of the gun or nozzle manufacturer.

Oil use silicon and acid free, non-resining special oil or grease. Spray Gun Oil (TP Trick, if in a jam use petroleum jelly)

Deluxe Brush Cleaning Kit w/ Lube: $22.00

Detailed Thorough cleaning (after the basic Routine cleaning):
  1. Cleaning the outside: Wash down the outside of the gun body, including the air cap, using a brush and thinner.
  2. Dismantling: Remove air cap, material nozzle and needle, clean all parts with thinner and brush. Attention: Ensure you always use proper tools to dismantle, do not apply force (hit with a hammer, pliers and spanners are a no no!). Clean parts with brush, special brush and special nozzle cleaning pin. Never insert wire brushes, paper clips, key files or similar, because this can ruin the delicate passages in your gun and change your spray pattern for the worse - replacement parts may become necessary. For storage, when reassembling you may use lubrication on your needles, nozzle and aircap threads.

WATCH YOUR ENVIRONMENT - When cleaning by hand, ensure that no dirt particles get inside the body of the pistol through the air intake or the paint nozzle drill holes.
  3. Assembly: Brush the paint pin, needle spring and all sliding parts and bearings with a thin coat of silicon and acid free, non-resining special oil or grease. Re-install the parts in the reverse order.

Apply a little special oil or grease to the outside of the moving parts at the bearings too.

THE NO NO! Painters often thoroughly “soak” the spray guns in thinner which has already been used and dirty. Even the most remote drill holes and ducts become blocked with loosened residual paint. The affect of the accumulation of dirt are not immediately apparent, but with the course of time they completely block the air ducts. Treating an intricate, delicate spray gun poorly is one of the “deadly sins“ of a painter.

Professionals - Invest wisely! For professionals investing in a GUN WASHERS OR SOLVENT SAVER is a terrific option to save time and money in the long run. And is the real viable option for a professional. Time and solvent saved – approx. 0.1 l thinner for mechanical cleaning compared to around 1 l for “hand washing“ – such plant provide the guarantee that the painting equipment always optimally functions. It is also environmentally friendly and is mandatory in some areas for paint shops in accordance with the VOC Ordinance in some locations. The sequence of work is extremely easy: after pre-cleaning the pistol and pot with the brush fed with cleaning agent, the fully emptied spray gun (do not pour the residues in the washing container!) is placed on the flushing nozzle with the open pot ahead and the trigger guard is fixed with a clamp. 1 minutes later YOUR DONE!

What do I use to clean my gun?

Simple: Use whatever you generally use to clean your paint normally. i.e. lacquer thinner, water, mineral sprits.

Use only liquids approved or recommended by the paint suppliers for your materials. Common such items are water, acetone, mineral spirits. Avoid Chlorinated hydrocarbon solvents, e.g. 1,1,1-trichloro ethane, methylene chloride, etc. can lead to chemical reactions and corrosion on the aluminum or the galvanized parts of the spray guns. (Attention: 1,1,1-trichloro ethane combines with even small quantities of water to form caustic hydrochloric acid!) In addition, solvent-based and water-based paints should not be used with one and the same spray gun: Cleaning agents for paints containing solvents are generally incompatible with water-based paints. Accidental combined operation can lead to defects in the paint surface (craters, stains, poor adhesion, etc.).

Remember you should also take care of your lines and pipes!

Oil and Dirt can build up in your air lines also. If you have hard pipe it is good to flush these with solvent once in a while. After oil has bled through the whole air pipe network you must thoroughly flush with solvent and blown dry. Omitted maintenance is fatal in very long and twisting pipe networks: if all the contamination cannot be removed the compressed air network has to be renewed, and this is expensive.