Has anyone made their own vehicle wash ? Can you use acrylics ? Any tips or advice
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Oil and mineral spirits works for me: burnt sienna, burn number… sometimes a slightly darker shade of the base color. What I don’t do is use black. Ever.
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Same here.
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Oil paints and turpenoid. Similar to above.
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One ounce of Turpenoid to a small pea sized glop of oil paint. Mix well and apply. As Rob stated, Burnt Umber, Burnt Sienna, etc. but not Black. Too stark.
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I use cheap (but not bargain) watercolour, the stuff that comes in tubes. It’s much simpler and cleaner than oils. You need only water, and you can dab excess colour off with a bit of kitchen paper, or if it’s gone on too dense, simply re-wet it and thin it down a bit. A few greens and browns will give you all the options you need.
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I feel old … “Home-made wash” is how everybody used to do that until, what, ten or fifteen years ago? when paint manufacturers began selling pre-mixed ones 
All you do is put a little paint on a palette, then add a good deal more thinner (water for acrylics, white spirit for enamel or oil paints) until you have dirty water/white spirit. Put it on the model and see if it’s thin enough yet, or if it’s perhaps too thin — a good place to test this is on the underside, where it won’t be seen. In the former case, add some more thinner, in the latter case, a bit more paint. You can thin it straight on the model if you feel it’s too thick after all, as long as you do that before it dries. It’s better to mix a wash that’s too thin, BTW, than one that’s too thick: you can always wait for it to dry and add more wash when it’s too thin, while if it’s too thick it will be hard to correct once it’s dried.
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Yes you can use acylics, but be fore warned. They set up fast and depending on the type of finish ( gloss, flat) means you have to pay attention to the tide marks. Oils and enamels give you more time to play.
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Yes ,I know you can buy washes ,but sometimes you run out and around here theres no real hobby shops to run to .
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For my first weathering projects, early on, I would use the dark wash that accumulated in the bottom of my brush wash-out bottle. (Lacquer)
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Short answer is “yes.”
In addition to all of the really good suggestions made above, other advantages are:
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Making your own washes is inexpensive almost to the point of zero additional costs since you likely already have the paint and thinners on hand.
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Making your own washes is hugely flexible because you have a near infinite pallet of colors to use and can mix your own washes to whatever opacity you desire.
When you use pre-mixed washes you are limited to what the purveyor of those washes has done with regard to colors, opacity, and other working properties. Making your own washes (as with many, many other modeling techniques) also helps you develop and advance your own skills, knowledge and abilities. In short, it can also help you be a better modeler.
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I used to “recycle” the contents of the jar with thinner (white spirits for enamel) that I used to clean the brushes and the airbrush.
Waste not, want not …
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Yup, the ol’ brush cleaner wash is still useful.
I have never used a pre-made wash. A waste of money in my books. I still make my own, usually from oils or craft store acrylic paints. They are just too easy to make yourself.
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This is probably going to sound petty crazy, but here goes. I use acrylics exclusively, and I keep a small bowl on my work bench with nothing but water in it for cleaning my brushes. It may not be perfect, but I’ve never noticed that my brushes don’t seem clean enough. Because I’m using a lot of browns, greens and black paints, after a while the water becomes a very dark brownish color.
I just take a very large brush and wash that stuff all over the vehicle. Hey, that’s what happens to my car on the highway!
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As long as you don’t use any metallics that works too.
In fact, I segregate my brushes. If a brush is used for any metallic, it may never again be used for non metallic paint.
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Absolutely true. No matter how much you try, you can NEVER get ALL that paint out!
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Silly question(s). Are all colour spectrums used for washes? Is oils the easier medium to use?
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Not sure what you mean by colour spectrums, but I normally make my washes as either a darker version of the base colour, if it’s for shading a model, or with a dirt colour, if it’s for weathering.
As for paints, I don’t know if oils will be easiest because I never got into using them. I mostly use acrylics thinned with water, because they dry fairly quickly, but you have to be careful of tide marks and wick away paint where it builds up on vertical or sloping sides before it gets the chance to dry. Washes of enamel paint with white spirit flow better, though, and I suppose the same applies to ones made with oil paint. (Oh, and stay away from using modern white spirits that aren’t petroleum-based. I found that washes made with some of those take several days to dry, when petroleum-based ones take only a few hours.)
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Jakko, by colour spectrum, I mean are all colours of the rainbow used, I may have worded my question wrong. You’ve answered question that question by using darker or lighter shades for washes.
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Hello!
One trick that you might find handy while mixing your own acrylic wash would be to add a few drops of future equivalent to the mix - this enhances the flow and makes for a better wash. I hope this helps you - good luck with your washes and have a nice day
Paweł
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