Grumdril":3ggl4q97 said:
I'm generally a fan of Vallejo paints but sometimes the shaking thing is a right pain and sometimes it seems to get me nowhere.
There's a bit of hope for you Paul, I have remedied this fairly easily with my Vallejo paints.
I know exactly the scenario you describe, Vallejo paints, some only depositing filmy liquid no matter how much you shake it. I have just fixed this for a bunch of my Vallejos without too much cost or effort.
Two things:
1.Pop the top off the bottle - they come off and snap back on easily with hand force - get a coffee stick and stir. My paints are in various states from "as new" to "all pigment having solidified to a doughy lump and won't blend with the paint medium no matter how much I shake the bottle" (the filmy liquid is probably paint medium separated from paint pigment, that's my guess). So far all paint bottles I've tried have blended back into serviceable paint and all my bottles are around 20 years old. Maybe your paints have lost so much medium they're beyond saving, this I wouldn't know, but restoring my old paints was doable
2.I bought a can of 500 metal bb pellets, popping a couple in each bottle. How much it counteracts the paint settling I can't tell but the bb's cost me somewhere around £5 and putting them in takes a few seconds per bottle. Worth a try in my opinion but I consider this more optional than step 1, which was crucial.
It certainly was a bit mucky to wipe paint off the nozzles before as I put them together and my 72 bottles are a few hours work but I chose to do that instead of spending £144 at replacing them at £2 each (or more).
And just to be clear I'm not for Vallejo as a paints choice over others, some people have already pointed out that other brands seem superior in not settling as much. But if what you have is a large set of Vallejos already this could perhaps be an option to splurging on a new set.
DISCLAIMER: I don't know if a lead pellet can have any adverse effects on the paint. Just thought I'd throw that out there before I propagate some way to ruin your entire paint set... at the very least I should mention that lead is not the most friendly of substances, whether you want to be as gung-ho about it as I am is up to you