Old paints.

Best Selling RPGs - Available Now @ DriveThruRPG.com

Bunch

The other Mods are geese!
Moderator
Joined
Aug 16, 2017
Messages
16,673
Reaction score
36,357
Specifically I have a bunch of old Reaper Master Series paints from roughly 2007-2009. Some seem dried out and whatnot. Can I recover these or is it time to toss them? I saw some Army Painter stainless steel balls I thought might be worth tossing in them and seeing if I could mix them up. Is that worth trying?
 
ehhh, if it was the'88 Citadels or old Ral Parthas I'd say yeah, you can recover them with an agitator and some Medium, newer Citadels no way. I don't know about Reaper Master Series, it's going to depend on how water-based the original formulas were I'd think.
 
ehhh, if it was the'88 Citadels or old Ral Parthas I'd say yeah, you can recover them with an agitator and some Medium, newer Citadels no way. I don't know about Reaper Master Series, it's going to depend on how water-based the original formulas were I'd think.
That's not the answer I wanted to hear. Therefore it must be wrong. Try again.

:hehe:
 
Do you think a rock tumbler would work for shaking paints? I was thinking of throwing 4-5 paints in one and letting it run for a day or so.
 
huh, never thought about it. Worth a shot I suppose.
 
Give them the water (or thinner) test... add some, shake, and wait. Shake every time you see them (i.e. leave them somewhere obvious), and check again after a couple days. I've saved quite a few old paints this way, although I had particularly bad luck with metallics. They always seem to botch their saving throws...
 
Along these lines. I get sonicare toothbrushes that get so gross( Kids) that I am no longer willing to let them be in human mouths. I was thinking of putting a few of them around a dropper bottle and turning them on to maybe bounce around on the table and agitate the paints. Thoughts?
 
I bought a paint shaker (basically a nail varnish shaker) and that does ok.
 
Along these lines. I get sonicare toothbrushes that get so gross( Kids) that I am no longer willing to let them be in human mouths. I was thinking of putting a few of them around a dropper bottle and turning them on to maybe bounce around on the table and agitate the paints. Thoughts?
Could strap the paint bottle to it.
 
Do you think a rock tumbler would work for shaking paints? I was thinking of throwing 4-5 paints in one and letting it run for a day or so.
I'm having visions of the lids coming open and paint being shaken everywhere. Sounds like fun. You should definitely try it. :thumbsup:
 
Sadly I think your paints are likely toast. I have a bunch of Citadel paints that I'm afraid have met the same fate. The lids just are not as airtight as bottles with screw on lids. I'm worried about what I'm going to find on my Testors Model Master, Polly Scale and Floquil paints when I start going through them. I've got probably close to $1000 of hobby paint, but I haven't done much in the past 5 years.

When I was actively painting, I'd periodically go through and add a little distilled water to keep them good. 5 years of neglect and I'm afraid I'm going to be starting over. Most of the Testors brands aren't even available anymore.

As far as shakers, I have one similar to this one . Time consuming but it works pretty well, they sell a battery powered one too, although I don't see a benefit to batteries for this use.

1666121618716.png

I've also got one of these , it works great for paints with an open top, but not so much for the dropper style bottles.

1666121813103.png
 
Sadly I think your paints are likely toast. I have a bunch of Citadel paints that I'm afraid have met the same fate. The lids just are not as airtight as bottles with screw on lids. I'm worried about what I'm going to find on my Testors Model Master, Polly Scale and Floquil paints when I start going through them. I've got probably close to $1000 of hobby paint, but I haven't done much in the past 5 years.

When I was actively painting, I'd periodically go through and add a little distilled water to keep them good. 5 years of neglect and I'm afraid I'm going to be starting over. Most of the Testors brands aren't even available anymore.

As far as shakers, I have one similar to this one . Time consuming but it works pretty well, they sell a battery powered one too, although I don't see a benefit to batteries for this use.

View attachment 50827

I've also got one of these , it works great for paints with an open top, but not so much for the dropper style bottles.

View attachment 50828
I'm rolling some now. I'll let y'all know how it comes out.
 
Could strap the paint bottle to it.
I might try this on one too just for comparison.

Edit - Nope. Apparently I failed my hoading skill check and threw away perfectly usable not fit for human mouths vibrating toothbrushes. What was I thinking?!?!?!?
 
Here is a thought, go to a tire shop with a bucket full of paints. Have them pull a tire, fill it with paint bottles. Drive around for a week, then have them remove the paint bottles. If that can't shake them up, then they are truly dead.
 
Here is a thought, go to a tire shop with a bucket full of paints. Have them pull a tire, fill it with paint bottles. Drive around for a week, then have them remove the paint bottles. If that can't shake them up, then they are truly dead.
That's pretty much what a rock tumbler is.
 
I haven’t seen a Reaper Master paint yet I haven’t been able to reconstitute. My oldest are easily 10-12 years old.

I use equal parts Vallejo Thinner, Flow Improver, and Water. I let it sit for a while, then mash and stir with a wooden stick. Eventually I’ll use the vortex mixer for a few minutes, then see if it needs more stirring. It could be Play-doh in the bottle, it’ll come back eventually.
 
Do you think a rock tumbler would work for shaking paints? I was thinking of throwing 4-5 paints in one and letting it run for a day or so.
As long as it doesn't knock the caps off the paint bottles.
 
As long as it doesn't knock the caps off the paint bottles.
They're rolling on their sides without enough room to rotate so I think I'm safe
 
So rolling them seems to work ok. I still need to clean up a few nozzles that have dried shut.

They don't have agitators in them. Seems like these must be some of the earlier versions because I gather they started adding them in recent years. I've never added agitators before. Is it as simple as taking the dropper nozzle off with pliers and dropping a ball or two in? Is it tricky to put the nozzle back on and get a good seal?
 
Not the same paints, but I never had a problem doing that with the Vallejo paints. Just pop the eye dropper out, do whatever, and pop it back in...

If you're worried, maybe just try one and see how it goes?
 
So rolling them seems to work ok. I still need to clean up a few nozzles that have dried shut.

They don't have agitators in them. Seems like these must be some of the earlier versions because I gather they started adding them in recent years. I've never added agitators before. Is it as simple as taking the dropper nozzle off with pliers and dropping a ball or two in? Is it tricky to put the nozzle back on and get a good seal?
It's easy. Pop the top off, drop one or two in and pop it back in. Don't worry about the seal. Just make sure the agitators are stainless steel, stone, anything that won't rust.
 
So rolling them seems to work ok. I still need to clean up a few nozzles that have dried shut.

They don't have agitators in them. Seems like these must be some of the earlier versions because I gather they started adding them in recent years. I've never added agitators before. Is it as simple as taking the dropper nozzle off with pliers and dropping a ball or two in? Is it tricky to put the nozzle back on and get a good seal?

At one point I added agitators to a bunch of my paint bottles, I tried acrylic plastic balls, copper plated BBs, and stainless ball bearings. I did not find any of them worth the cost and effort, they didn't seem to make any improvement.
 
So rolling them seems to work ok. I still need to clean up a few nozzles that have dried shut.

They don't have agitators in them. Seems like these must be some of the earlier versions because I gather they started adding them in recent years. I've never added agitators before. Is it as simple as taking the dropper nozzle off with pliers and dropping a ball or two in? Is it tricky to put the nozzle back on and get a good seal?
I have had some of my paints for 30 years. I use a small glass sphere (smaller than a marble) as an agitator for my traditional paint pots (not in my nozzle paints, they don't seem to need it). That + water works for most of them. If a paint is really bad I do what CRKrueger @CRKrueger does

I use equal parts Vallejo Thinner, Flow Improver, and Water. I let it sit for a while, then mash and stir with a wooden stick. Eventually I’ll use the vortex mixer for a few minutes, then see if it needs more stirring. It could be Play-doh in the bottle, it’ll come back eventually.

Metallic paints are hard to rescue but everything else comes back.
 
At one point I added agitators to a bunch of my paint bottles, I tried acrylic plastic balls, copper plated BBs, and stainless ball bearings. I did not find any of them worth the cost and effort, they didn't seem to make any improvement.
I like them. Especially with the vortex mixer. After putting the paint angled on the bottom rim, and then flipped upside down on the cap, I can tell when the paint is good to go or not just by the sound of the agitator spinning. Even just shaking by hand, the agitator movement will tell me whether the paint needs to be opened and manually thinned.
 
I have had some of my paints for 30 years. I use a small glass sphere (smaller than a marble) as an agitator for my traditional paint pots (not in my nozzle paints, they don't seem to need it). That + water works for most of them. If a paint is really bad I do what CRKrueger @CRKrueger does
When I didn't know much about acrylics, I tossed out a crapload of Ral Partha paints that were completely dehydrated. A trip to an art store for some Liquitex or Winsor & Newton (Vallejo wasn't doing all their hobby lines back then, I didn't see their stuff until the 90's) thinner/medium/flow improver and I'd probably still have them. Kind of lousy paints compared to what we use today, but I really liked some of their colors.
Metallic paints are hard to rescue but everything else comes back.
Yeah, with just water, you probably can't do metallics. You probably need Medium for metallics in addition to the other stuff.
 
Man, all this talk of paints has me thinking about The Last Grenadier in Burbank. They had acrylics, oils, all kinds of stuff that the professional Osprey Wargamer types used.
 
Man, all this talk of paints has me thinking about The Last Grenadier in Burbank. They had acrylics, oils, all kinds of stuff that the professional Osprey Wargamer types used.
That was a 90 minute drive in high school but we made the trek once in 1990 right after the first Eldar Aspect list came out. Some dude there already had an army and my Marines were slaughtered.
 
Last edited:
When I didn't know much about acrylics, I tossed out a crapload of Ral Partha paints that were completely dehydrated. A trip to an art store for some Liquitex or Winsor & Newton (Vallejo wasn't doing all their hobby lines back then, I didn't see their stuff until the 90's) thinner/medium/flow improver and I'd probably still have them. Kind of lousy paints compared to what we use today, but I really liked some of their colors.

Yeah, with just water, you probably can't do metallics. You probably need Medium for metallics in addition to the other stuff.

I have some Liquitex, definitely worth a shot. I've got around 200 bottles of paint, if I can save even half that will be great.
 
What I've learned looking at my old paints is I don't like red. I really like tan.

Probably 30 droppers of Reaper and I don't see a red in the collection. I bought them all at GenCon when they were having a big sale. I can get you 5 different shades of skin , wood or leather. No red. Six blues. Various metals. Purples a yellow or two. No red. Wtf was I thinking?!?
 
Just for the record I had a brown that was pretty solid. Shaking it made no noticeable noise. I added two agitator balls. Still pretty much nothing. Dropped it in the rock polisher for an hour and now it's sounding pretty good. So rock polisher + agitator balls for the win.
 
Banner: The best cosmic horror & Cthulhu Mythos @ DriveThruRPG.com
Back
Top