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How does the Cold affect your modeling?


Dick Montgomery

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The Texas winter has finally arrived (central TX) and its 22F this morning. Since my spray booth and painting machinery are in the garage its just a bit uncomfortable to do any airbrushing. I've done some airbrushing with the temps in the upper 30s but now that we are below the freezing point I'm thinking I'll let it warm up a bit before shooting any paint. I'm not worried about the paint freezing...doubt that it freezes at the same temp as water, but my fingers get chilly. Note that in Central Texas there are, for all intents and purposes, no basements. The rock and soil are not basement-friendly. That means one is in the garage or in the house.

 

How about you? How does the cold affect your modeling?

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Before getting the man cave, all I did was build. I had to wait until the weather warmed before venturing into the garage to paint. I woudl do the occasional rattle can job but that was it....just too cold to stay out and spray.

 

Mark

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I'm lucky enough to have an extra bedroom turned into a model room, so the cold really doesn't effect me. But in the summer, I will spend more time outside. Yes, it can get hot in the NW, and I have open window air-conditioning. Slugman :smiley17:

 

 

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I have a large shop with a propane heater w/fan. It warms it up great. Also use one of those oil filled electric heaters to keep things from freezing off when I'm not there. I've always thought that if I didn't have the room to model, I'd buy a small camping trailer for a hobby room. A little conversion and you could have a workshop with power.

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For the past week temps have been below normal for southern Oklahoma (air temp was 6F last night) so no airbrushing. Normally I can warm the garage up enough to paint, so usually not too big of an impact. I hope the big thaw arrives as predicted tomorrow!

 

-dave

Edited by Dave23
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In the Chicago area, I have all my kits, paints, work space, and spray booth in the lower level of my house where it all stays warm. I only use the garage for spray bomb and airbrushing big models that won't fit in the booth. The tradeoff to the cold is the amount of time spent at the end of a snow shovel or thrower vs. time spent indoors ignoring the snow removal project. Yesterday I spent four hours outside just on moving 8-15 inches of snow around and getting my SUV out of the driveway so I could take my wife out to dinner and then go to a model club meeting. No time on the bench yesterday; maybe today.

 

Ed

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Guest raydee

Ed, what is this "snow shovel" of which you speak? Is it a new model? Perhaps a new manufacturer located in Canada?

Edited by raydee
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The weather doesn't affect me that much, as I don't get that much time in regardless of what the temp is outside... :smiley3:

 

Seriously, I try not to do too much work with the airbrush during the cold months, as it's set up in the attic. But if I am on a roll and need to get something done, all I really have to do is leave the door open for a while to get a little extra heat up there. I find that it is better to work there in the winter rather than the summer. Summer months are really too warm and humid to airbrush, while I can deal with the slightly colder winter temps.

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It makes me squint!!

 

My workshop is in the back corner of our walk-out basement. I have a window in front of the bench and during the winter days, when the sun is out, it is really bright. :smiley16:

 

Workshop_winter.jpg

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I have a model cave in my basement. It stays warm most of the time and a little space heater helps on those really cold days. (Like lately, where the air temp has been in the single digits the last two nights and we haven't had a high above freezing in over a week.)

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I have a closet sized (5'x8') room in a corner of the basement of our split-level house...well, I call it a basement, the wife calls it "the terrace level"...but it's heated. I do all of my benchwork there. I airbrush, and occasionally spraybomb, in the garage. With the low temps in the teens for the last several days, there has been NO painting done whatsoever. But, I've had several great hours at the bench. When we get back to our normal North Georgia weather, the garage will probably be comfortable enough on most days to spray some paint...

Edited by Keith Pruitt
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Ed, what is this "snow shovel" of which you speak? Is it a new model? Perhaps a new manufacturer located in Canada?

 

Hi, Ray,

 

I believe a "snow shovel" originated as a piece of U.S. Army accessory equipment to be hung, strapped, bolted, or duct taped to the side of a tank turret. There was a Congressional investigation a few years ago regarding the $892 per shovel cost billed to the Army by the manufacturer. Nobody went to jail, but the manufacturer recovered their legal expenses by raising the price to $2,428 per shovel. The foldup model stored in a G.I.'s backpack is a much better buy at $338 each. Now you know.

 

Ed

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Well, thanks to those "Canadians" not keeping their arctic jet stream to themselves.....we've had a record breaking COLD week here in Florida! It's been 30-45 for the daytime temps (20dgs below normal), cloudy, rainy, and thus feels even colder then it is. :smiley7:

 

The net result is a lost week. Since I model in the garage, where it's basically the outside temp, I've stayed indoors, done a little research, and surfed the web. Next week looks better, with highs in the 60's by Thursday. I'll be back at the bench by then! :smiley20:

 

GIL :smiley16:

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I have a 12 by 19 former 1 car attached garage that i enclosed.It has heat and a/c.So i can build year round.The low has been 22f for a few days here.The temps have broken many records down here in sw Louisiana.

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I use a one car garadge as my modeling room . I is insulated and has heat and AC from the central unit so I usually don't have any trouble modeling winter or summer.

 

Texas :smiley20:

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Cold? What's that?

 

 

Seriously, I have my model room inside this two-bedroom condo. The only time it gets cold is at night so I do my spray painting during the day. I do have to open the window to 'vent' my 'spraybooth' after all.

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I've got no room to grip on this one. I live in Southern California and we don't have seasons like most of the country. I think its cold if the temp goes below 50! My work space is also in the garage to keep little hands away and the solvent smells out of the house. The only thing I do inside anymore is decals. Net effect, the output is about the same all year round.

 

Chris

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It makes me squint!!

 

My workshop is in the back corner of our walk-out basement. I have a window in front of the bench and during the winter days, when the sun is out, it is really bright. :smiley16:

 

Workshop_winter.jpg

 

Now thats a beautiful view!

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Very impressive Garden Gargoyle, Clare....perhaps a "wash" with some flat black will make those shadows a bit deeper.....

Seriously...that thing is huge!

 

So much for the Texas winter. Temps are pushing the low '60s and we ought not to see but one more shot at freezing temps...but who knows?

 

At least we don't get hurricanes and earthquakes here. Now, a tornado or two isn't that unusual...

 

Thanks for sharing guys!

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I have a storeage shed kind of like Clares in the "spring" picture. Have the spray booth in there. I usually wait untill its in the 30's then heat it with an oil filled electric heater, this gets it up into the low 60's and I'm good to go. I also will heat up a pan of water to boiling, let it sit for a few minutes to cool then pitch the paint bottles in for about 5 minutes. Seems to work ok. I tend to wait untill I've got several models to airbrush then go at it. Winter up on the side of a mountain in Idaho ain't all that paint frendly :smiley14: G.L.

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