I just started learning to airbrush and I am tackling the wheels of my stug IV. I primed with Badger grey primer. Then hit the rubber with Tamiya flat black. About two hours later I went to mask them with a wheel mask and some of the black peeled off. I don’t think I waited long enough. How long should I wait to apply the next color with my wheel mask?
Not a scientific answer, but I always leave it a day or two at least before masking. And far too often I wind up leaving it weeks or months due to that pesky “real life”…
I suspect a few hours just isn’t long enough to completely harden.
also stick the tape on the back of your hand before,make the tape less sticky
Here is my drill for painting something that needs masking. Just before putting the primer on, wipe down the surface with alcohol. Prime with mr surfacer. (I know people rave about stynylrez but I’ve not had good results with it). Let sit over night. Paint it. The dry time between coats doesn’t seem to matter, but after the final coat before masking, let it sit overnight. Then mask, and like vicious, stick the tape to your arm a couple of times before putting it on. While I know that even this is not foolproof, since I started following this method over 2 years ago, I haven’t had a single lifting incident.
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Thanks for the replies. I’ll wait a bit longer then. Also just for clarity it’s a circle template for wheels, and not a traditional sticky type mask
Like Phil says, I give my Tamiya acrylics an overnight cure before doing anything. I use either Frog Tape for delicate surfaces or here lately I’ve started using silly putty to mask. I haven’t had any problem with those lifting off paint…
How long did you wait between applying the Badger Primer and applying the Flat Black. If done from one to the next within a short time, the primer would not have had a chance to cure and bond to the base surface.
The primer to flat black was 24 hours. The primer seems solid just the black paint was lifting.
After airbrushing I wait at least a week before touching the model again, be it for masking, decalling or coating …
I just start another model (or two 
). Disadvantage is “too much work in progress” and I try to limit now to 2-3 models in progress but it just aint worth risking a model on which I spent a lot of money and time to go a tiny bit faster.
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I have ran into the same problems before and this is what I did to fix my problems. I did my own testing and found that I have to let the primer dry overnight even know it feels very dry in a hr or so. Then I can airbrush multiple tamiya base colors the next day without any problems. I do use mig surface primer with mostly tamiya base colors but this is probably subject to change where you live and how dry it is and what the air temperatures. I also quit using masking tape and use blue tack now. It seems to really help and you never run out of blue tack because you use reuse it it never goes bad.
I give the primer 24 hours to dry and then the topcoat 24 hours to dry. If masking is required I give the paint 24 hours dry time before masking. I paint right after masking and then remove the masking as soon as the second color dries to the touch. I use Tamiya masking tape. As a side note, I race slot cars. To protect the car’s paint I apply some electrical tape the color of the car to the areas that would rub the track in a roll over. I tape a small area on top of the front fender and a small strip across the top near the front windshield is usually enough. With only one exception, I have never had any paint peel off when I removed/ replaced the tape. The exception was Humbrol’s gloss orange in the spray can. I primed the car and shot two coats of color. The top color coat pulled when I replaced the tape after a few rollovers, leaving the original color coat layer.