Fisheyes in paint on resin parts

[vintagerpm]

I started priming (Tamiya lacquer) some resin parts and I'm getting a lot of fisheyes on them. I did my usual cleaning of soaking them in Westley's Bleche White. Even wiped one part down in alcohol after seaing fisheyes on the first parts. No luck. Four of he seven parts look like this:

fisheyes by VintageRPM

Could my Bleche White nolonger be any good? (It is years old.) Is there something else I should clean the parts with?

Mike

[Ben_B]

I usually use Purple Power cleaner from the auto parts store, but I think it’s the same stuff as Blech-White. I’m not sure if it goes bad over time. Sometimes, even that won’t get the release agent off so I’ll put the parts in a bath of alcohol for a while. I’ve even given some resin parts a blast of carb cleaner. Some plastic in Chinese kits (Trumpeter, Kinetic, Kitty Hawk) seems to be impregnated with oils. No amount of soaking and washing will fix it.

Ben

[starfighterace]

Fisheyes are caused by static electricity on the surface of the part. Usually when this happens to me is because I just wiped the part with a cloth to dry it faster. It can also be caused by too much carrier, not enough pigment, and not stirred/shaken enough to allow the pigment to fully disperse in the pigment.

Just let it cure, sand it with 800-1000 grit to level off the surface, and try again.

[vintagerpm]

Thanks guys. I'll try a couple of things and let you know how it goes.

Mike

[2whl]

Mike, you're not the only one experiencing fisheyes. I usually soak my resin in a bath of Polident, which I did with these parts. I use Tamiya primer (either fine white or gray) and have not normally had problems. I have found that the fisheyes are usually caused by some sort of contaminant on the surface of the part. I didn't notice the fisheyes until I had sprayed some semi-black.





So I scubbed the parts with this stuff that my wife swears by to remove grease and oils. I first sanded down the paint around the blemishes. After a vigorous scrubbing with an old tooth brush, I rinsed the parts with water and let them dry. Then another shot of black. It seems to have worked.

[mustang1989]

I use Dawn dish soap and just good ol' fashioned time dry as well and it does work wonders.

[vintagerpm]

You know, I never thought of using dish soap, and I clean all my styrene parts with it. Go figure.

At any rate, I resoaked and scrubed everything in Bleche White. Four of the five parts took primer just fine this time. The top of the body still has issues, so I'll sand and wash that tomorrow with dish soap and take another shot.

Thanks guys.

Mike

[vintagerpm]

Noticed the fisheyes were worse than I thought, so I stripped al the parts of primer using Poly-S Liftoff. Then I scrubbed the parts in dish soad that said it was "tough on grease". Reprimed today and there are still 2 bad spots. I will have used an entire can of Tamiya primer on this kit if I strip it again. Not to mention having already fallen a week behind in my build. In 30 years of building resin kits, I have never, ever had this happen.

Mike

[arcticwolf]

I'm wondering is something continuing to bleed out of the resin? Like maybe it hasn't cured properly?

[vintagerpm]

OK. Third time was the charm. Finally got an good primer coat on it.

Mike