Does anyone use this spraybooth?

I bought a Pace paint booth 10 years ago and it still runs perfectly. It is 36" wide by 28 deep. It's awesome in all regards and has a big fan to move a lot of air   

 

Check it out. Www.pacepaintbooths.com. 

 

Get what you pay for. 

The one at the Modeltrainstuff link looks a lot like one that is available at a similar price from Micro-Mark. IMHO it's too small for 0 gauge - you can fit a boxcar in there but not a locomotive of any size. 

 

Paasche makes some nice paint booths, but they cost quite a bit more. Chicago Airbrush is a good source for Paasche. I bought a Paasche VLS airbrush and some accessories from them a while back, and the guy I talked to on the phone was very knowledgeable and helpful. 

Looks OK and should work. I would prefer exterior exhaust,

if possible or could be added.

  Click photo to enlarge.

I made one, a $10 box fan & 2 24" X 24" furnace filters from Menards $.99 ea. Works great and cut some scrap card board for the box.    TRAIN NERD AL

I made mine with scrap fiber board panals I garbage picked for the shroud, a sheetmetal table I garbage picked to place the shroud on, an old aquarium flourecent light, & a range hood I took out of my kitchen because my wife said it was out of date. I did have to buy some drier vent & an adapter to vent it outside & a furnace filter to keep the overspray off the fan blades, but that's about it. It's bigger than anything you could buy, so there's lots of room. Airbrushing is fine, but rattle cans put out too much spray & the fan takes a second or two to catch it all,  so I still use a mask. 

Thanks for the replies.  The Pace products look awfully good, though 36" and corresponding depth is like what I made previously and for my purposes that size is serious overkill; it's a lot more spray booth than I need or want as it will take up space I don't have and far exceeds the space I need to shoot postwar Lionel engines and passenger cars.

 

The booth in my original post is more than a tad too small.  I might be able to make it work, but as a couple of guys posted above, it's not really intended (IMHO) for O gauge.  TRG, I believe the hose shown is flexible and can be ventilated in almost any direction.

 

EDIT:  While I was typing, a couple more replies came in.  They are very much how I built my initial booth (although I didn't replace the bride's range hood).

 

Thanks, again, for the replies.

 I use the booth you show in the pic Pingman. I have painted Williams F 3 shells in it without problems. Did many tender shells, lots of models. Its great for the money. I put the hose endout the window to vent the fumes. You will have to clean or replace the filters often.

Rob

Be aware that these are great for acrylics but do not have explosion proof fans. Atomized solvent based paints makes a great bomb.

Most explosion proof spray booths use fan belt drivin exhaust fans with isolated motors.
Just saying....

oldrob, thanks for the reply.  The only items I will be painting are F3 shells and frames, and 15" aluminum passenger cars and their parts for my own use.  Sent you an email to learn how often and the cost of the filters since you mentioned that they need to be changed frequently.

 

Ffffreddd, thanks for your reply.  I won't be shooting solvent based paint; it was good that you mentioned the explosion potential among other hazards of these volatile formulations.

 

A cardboard box and a vacuum cleaner should work.

Pingman, from what I've read about this particular spraybooth, some users have purchased two of them and apparently easily adapted them to fit side by side lengthwise making one spray booth long enough to handle most larger engines and buildings. Plus, with they've gotten the added bonus of double exhaust units. Just a thought.

BTW, would like to know from person who emailed you, just how frequently the filters need replacing? 

OGG, saw an ad with two of the units paired side-by-side into a single unit w/ two exhaust fans.  Very appealing.  I'd probably start with a single and see if that was adequate or not, and have the option of adding the second unit.

 

I'll post when I receive a reply from oldbob on the filter replacement/cost questions.

 

 

The 30" Paasche unit has dual fans. 

Thanks for the reply.  Can you post a link to the Paasche unit?

This is the response from Chicago Airbrush on the use of solvent type paint with the Paasche spray booths:

 

They are not explosion proof if that's what you are asking. 

People do use them for solvent based paints; Im not sure

how risky it is.

 

Here's a link to the Chicago Airbrush page on spray booths. Chicago Airbrush They have hobby type units by Paasche and Artograph. The one that looks the best for trains is the Paasche HSSB-30-16, which has dual fans for a total of 540 cfm extraction. This is quite a bit more than the comparable Pace or Artograph units. The page on the Paasche website is here:

Paasche spray booth

 

Paasche does state that the booth should not be used with hazardous materials. I am personally inclined to doubt that normal hobby use painting one item at a time would build up enough VOC in the air to create an explosive condition, especially with the fumes being exhausted immediately and not allowed to build up, but caution is indicated and I wouldn't want to spend all day pushing solvent based paints in a hobby-type hood. 

 

Some good spray booth info starting at about the 1:40 mark.

 

Nice homemade spray booth. The light bar and the turntable are good add-ons. Tamiya makes a good turntable with clips to attach small parts. 

We made an enclosure on a shelf in the work room with a squirrel-cage fan we had lying around. Cost us about $20 for the MDF, cheap light, and a light switch to turn on everything. We have a Lazy Susan base for rotating stuff. It's large enough for anything we've wanted to spray so far.

 

Matt,

I like your spray booth. Good idea there.

Had a call this evening from oldbob; really nice man with a lot of experience with the booth I initiated this thread with.  He's shot many different items, not just trains.  But since I'm only interested in F3's and 15" passenger cars, he confirmed that the booth would be fine for my purposes as he had done virtually identical painting.

 

As for filter replacement, he said rattle can paints tend to use up the filter faster than airbrushed paint.  He usually uses one filter at a time, and they can be reused since much of what the filter collects can be removed--sort of like cleaning a rug outside.  He stressed that keeping the booth clean by wiping it with a moist shop towel was essential after filter changes.

 

He bought a "Masters" labeled spray booth on Amazon.  Visually and spec-wise it appears to be identical to that offered on ebay w/o the "Masters" name.  At his suggestion I looked at the Masters version.  It was priced about $20 or so more than the ebay version.

 

There are numerous ebay vendors of this booth.  I bought this tonight:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/201101...e=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

$73.95, shipping included, suits me fine.  As mentioned in an earlier post in this thread, if the unit is too small (and I consider this to be unlikely after talking to oldbob this evening) I can order a second unit and pair them for a much larger working space.

 

It will be awhile before I use the booth.  There are 6 or 7 passenger cars and two F3 A unit cabs to strip. 

 

Thanks, again, for all the replies--lots of good ideas, including in the video clip posted above.  I'll no doubt post on this booth once I actually use it.

rattle can paints tend to use up the filter faster than airbrushed paint

 

No surprise. My experience is that spray cans throw a lot more paint than is needed for the job. An airbrush is much easier to control, and the paint only goes where you aim it. With an extractor, some of the excess winds up in the filter. 

I built my own, but rarely use it.  I framed it with PVC piping.  The square sides are glued together, but the assembly is just pressure fitted for easy assembly and storage. 

I bought a cheap bathroom fan that fits into a plywood template at the back.  The corrugated exhaust goes out the back and under the garage door for several feet.  I drape it with a plastic tarp and place one under it.  It's about 3 feet in all dimensions.  I've mostly used it for winter painting.  I will heat it during spraying and a short drying time before giving it in to an interior environment to cure the paint.

I generally find it too much bother.  I probably just liked the building of it.  In general, I'll just wait for better weather.  My paint booth is sometimes my 30x40 garage with the cars taken out.

Alan

Thanks. We keep in clean by taping newspaper to the walls before spraying.