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Adding water to latex paint

Home Forums Pavement Striping Materials Adding water to latex paint

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  • #5459
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Hello. I am new to striping. Just bought a Graco 3400 used, a set of stencils and big roll of brown paper to test it out on. After servicing the machine the best I could tell from the manuals (good flush, TSL oil, cleaned carb, new plug, changed oil, cleaned filter, etc). I bought some pails of water based latex from sherwin williams and ran the thing the best I could tell how to. It took a while to read through the steps to get to spraying (don’t want to damage the machine because I’m too lazy to read), but the first lines were excellent. I had the pressure dial just under halfway usinga 319 tip. I added a little water to the paint to make it less viscous and easier for the machine to pump and avoid clogs. I can’t remember where I got the idea that this is what I am supposed to do, but as i said the lines were beautiful.

    Questions are: Is it OK/standard practice to add water? What are the advantages/disadvantages? What is a good ratio?

    Also my machine was putting out a lot of paint with the pressure knob a little less than halfway using a 319 tip. Worked great at a walking pace painting lines, but when I tried out my stencils, I had to hit them with very quick swiping bursts to not get excessive paint. Would switching to a 317 tip reduce the amount of paint at the same pressure? I am afraid to mess with it when it is working so nicely.

    #6043
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Other than water you can use a little rubbing alcohol this will thin the paint down and help it dry faster. Try reducing the engine speed i.e. throttle down halfway when doing stencils. A 319 tip is too much paint switch to a 317 if you start using chlorinated rubber use a 321 tip. Good Luck

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