Badger 350 Review

7/2010

Badger was kind enough to send me a model 350 to review. So now I can do a comparison of the 350 with the Paasche H. Here is what is in the kit. It's part number 350-4.

It includes the airbrush, 2 bottles, a wrench, a 1/4 oz. cup, Fine, Medium, and Heavy needle assemblies and air caps, and a 5 foot braided hose. The Fine parts are marked with an F, the Heavy parts with an H, and the Medium parts are unmarked.

There was a packing error. The tube with the heavy needle and tip contained a fine air cap. I e-mailed Badger customer service and got a nice e-mail back the next day apologizing and promising to send a replacement ASAP. A couple days later it was in my mail box.

First Impressions

Hey, it's plastic. But, there's nothing wrong with that if it's used correctly. The functional parts are metal. I believe it's some type of nylon. It's nicely finished, it feels good in the hand and it's comfortable to hold.

Here it is next to the Paasche H.

As you can see, it's smaller. It's also much lighter, 21 g vs. 87 for the Paasche. I prefer a lighter airbrush, so for me this is a plus. Also, the distance from the trigger to the nozzle is less, and it's not so nose heavy. The trigger is at an angle that feels very natural.

Here it is broken down.

The variety of materials used is interesting, but I believe they are adequate for the application. I've labeled them with what I believe they are. The medium and heavy needles are brass, but the fine needle appears to be stainless.

The little O ring under the trigger is clever. When you push the trigger, it seals the opening so air won't leak out. It doesn't completely stop the leak, but it's not bad. The trigger stroke is very short, but it's strictly on or off anyway. The trigger assembly is not removable, nor is the handle.

The needle seal doesn't appear to be Teflon. It looks like some sort of black neoprene. It must be solvent resistant, since the manual mentions spraying with lacquers. It is adjustable, and like the Paasche, you need a thin screwdriver blade. I found it tighter than I like and re-adjusted it. When I first removed the needles, there was little black deposit on them from the seal, so I cleaned it off with some polish. I applied a little Chapstick to the threads and rear body of the needle. It made them easier to install and adjust.

Instead of the Allen set screw of the Paasche, the 350 uses a wrench and a knurled locking ring to secure the needle to the body. The plastic body wouldn't hold up to a set screw. It's trickier to install than the Paasche because of the addition of the locking ring. In either brush, you need to really cinch it down or the needle will turn when you install a cup or bottle. One thing that could trip up a beginner is that if you grab the knurled tip when you're tightening the needle, you could easily over tighten the tip and split its end. Both brushes could be improved by making the needle so that it can't rotate in the body. This would not be hard to do, and it beats me why neither company did it.

The openings in the tips measure: Fine = 0.5mm Medium = 0.7mm Heavy = 1.0mm

Trying it out

The first thing I tried was hooking up the braided hose. I had a humongous leak. It turns out the hose relies on a metal to metal seal. (see the photo on the right). It was meant to couple to a smooth pipe on a normal compressor. I have a cheap piece of galvanized pipe on my kloodgy set-up and it leaked like a sieve. Teflon tape on the threads won't do any good. It has to be a smooth metal to metal contact. I could have gone to the hardware store and picked up a new piece of brass pipe with a nice end. But, being cheap, instead I reamed the end of the galvanized pipe with a large countersink bit in my hand drill. When it was nice and smooth, I rubbed a little bees wax on it and re-installed the hose. Leak gone. This is my only braided hose, so I don't know if other brands work the same way. One nice surprise, the wrench fits both the needle and the hose where it connects to the airbrush. You have to be careful if you lay the brush down while it's connected to the hose. It's so light that the weight of the hose can drag it off the bench. Actually, I found the hose to be sort of stiff and clumsy with this light airbrush. I tried the lighter plastic hose and it seemed a much better match, even though it will have more pressure loss. It's almost like airbrushing with a ball point pen.

Here is a sample done with black ink on paper towel with the medium tip and needle. To me, the H and 350 seem the same. And, I guess you could expect that since their basic design is so similar. Air pressure was set to 25 psi. I tried the fine needle and tip and, just like with the Paasche, I couldn't see any improvement. In fact, atomization seems better with the medium needle. I don't know if this is a limitation of the external mix design, or of my skill. Since both companies make a fine needle/tip, I have to assume it should make a difference. But, I am unable to see it. I sprayed some ModelMaster enamel on a plastic bottle using the medium tip and needle. It went on very nice. I think I could even do some freehand camouflage with this airbrush. The trick is to properly thin the paint, but that's true with any airbrush. Like the Paasche, it will put out a lot of paint if you need it. I don't see any need for the fine or heavy needle/tip assemblies for either brush.

Neither airbrush will give you the same atomization or detail as an internal mix brush, but certainly good enough for most purposes.

The manual says to clean by flushing. But, just like the Paasche, I found residue on the needle and inside the tip when I took them apart. You really need to dismantle them if you want to keep the brush clean.

Conclusion

I think Badger sells this airbrush short. Here is what they say about it:

The 350® is an external mix airbrush. Air and paint mix outside the airbrush, creating a larger, coarser "dot" pattern and providing a heavier spray volume. The 350® is superb for base coating, stenciling, stipling, touch up projects, etc.

Here is what Paasche says about the H:

Sturdy and flexible, the H & HS airbrushes are dependable and adaptable for practically any hobby or artistic use.

Let's face it, in a beauty contest the Paasche would win. That nice chrome looks like a million bucks. But, I think the 350 is just as capable as the Paasche. The main difference is the way it feels. If you prefer a heavy airbrush, the Paasche is what you want. But, if you want something light, you won't find anything lighter than the 350, especially with the plastic hose.

The 350 is widely available, and sales or discount coupons are common.

Another big thank you to Ken Schlotfeldt for the sample.

Postscript

Here's an e-mail I got from Ken about the tip sizes:

Don't get caught up thinking fine, medium, and large indicate the line an airbrush will produce. This is only a minor nominal effect of the needle/nozzle size difference. The classification of Fine, Medium, and Large apply more to the recommendation of what media can be properly used. Fine for inks, watercolors, dyes - Medium for properly reduced acrylics, lacquers, enamels - Large for more viscous glazes, base coats, industrial coatings

So, there you go. I was mis-interpreting the meaning of fine, medium and large. And I bet I'm not the only one who has done this.

I usually modify the spring in the air valve of my airbrushes for a lighter touch. I can't do this to the 350, and I found that after using it a while, the combination of stiff spring and small button bothered me. So, I came up with this. I super glued a piece of leather to a small washer. Then I used hot melt glue to attach the washer to the trigger. I know it looks funny, but it's a lot more comfortable. I found that re-installing the needle, tip and locking ring after cleaning was kind of tricky due to the way the tip is captured by the air cap. So, since I had an extra fine air cap, I decided to see if I could make it any easier. Here's what I did.

On the left is the un-modified air cap, and on the right is the modified one. I used my Dremel tool to cut away the bridge across the exit opening. Here is the modified air cap installed in the 350.

Since the tip is no longer trapped, it's now a little easier to install. I tested this setup with food coloring on a paper towel and found that it didn't seem to change the spray characteristics at all. I suppose you could do this same mod to the Paasche H. But, since it doesn't have the locking ring, there is probably less reason to do it.

How much air?

External mix airbrushes like the 350 and the Paasche H require more air than most internal mix airbrushes. Recently, a fellow on one of the forums was having problems with his 350. He had just bought a Badger 80-3N Breeze compressor and he couldn't get even paint flow. The paint came out in speckles. The brush worked fine with Propel canned gas.

The Breeze is a new product for Badger. It is a tiny plastic cased compressor with an external DC power supply. There is no pressure gauge. There is an air flow adjustment but no regulator.

I e-mailed Ken Schlotfeldt and asked if it should be powerful enough for the 350. He wrote back that they had done exhaustive testing with the 350 using fine components. To me this means that it may not work with medium and heavy tips and needles.

If you have or are going to buy an external mix airbrush, my advice is to avoid any of the tiny compressors in plastic cases. In fact, I would avoid them anyway. They may be sufficient for an internal mix brush with a fine tip, but even here they are marginal. There are enough variables that affect airbrushing without having a minimal air source.

An Upgrade

One thing I don't care for on the 350 is the black needle seal. I don't know how well it will hold up to harsh liquids like lacquer thinner. And, as I noted, it tends to rub off on the needle. I got to thinking about how similar the 350 is to the Paasche H, and on a hunch, I tried the H Teflon seal in the 350. It fits and works just fine!! The H seal, part number H-185, is available from Coast Airbrush for the princely sum of 60 cents.

An Adapter Problem

Here is a photo of my little Revell Corsair just after being painted with the 350. The paint is Rust-Oleum Painter's Touch decanted from a spray can with no thinning. It has not been polished yet. I want it to represent a restored aircraft.

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