Recent "advancements" in water-borne coatings have resulted in some very odd results, backing me into a corner, where I must use a hand-held spray gun for both clears and pigmented finishes. New "features", such as "micro-foaming" have pushed me away from the trusty old Titan 440i paint pump, which I normally would reach for when faced with large batches of parts in the spray booth. Terrible results with newer clears foaming up, causing cloudiness, and warnings on label of pigmented coatings about this new issue as well. (Glad I never invested in a Kremlin!)
Favorite hand-held is a gravity-feed Anest -Iwata, but even jumping to a 1.8 N/N set, some of the current formulations of clears are still having issues getting through and atomizing properly, many of which will only allow up to 5% for thinning. Too far a stretch to add a remote pot to a gravity feed, and tired of dropping $200 each step up in needle /nozzle sets, so...
Enter gun #2: Qual-spray 6008 from Homestead Finishing. A true master for pushing the thickest coatings through. Not as super-fine as the Anest, but decent enough. Bottom cup is cumbersome, and can require 4-6 refills in a single coating session.
Solution: get a remote pot. Okay, but now we're into all stainless steel for WB, which now include catalysts, which even more urgently pushes one to all Stainless Steel construction.
Bottom line question: Anyone have experience enough to suggest whether a 2qt or 2.5 gallon is better to work with, given the size of task? I imagine I'd like to be able to drop a gallon can into a 2.5 gallon pot, seal it up and only be faced with a single refill per session.
Good resources are always appreciated, but strong likelihood I'll stick with Homestead. Quite the investment for the SS versions, so really would like some input with others who may have done something similar in recent years. Is the extra grand for a 2.5gallon worth it over a 2qt?
Thanks,
Jeff