Tough times with brushes

[Duke Rich]

So, the other day whilst painting I got a phone call which needed to leave a bit urgently. Completely forgetting I hadn't washed off the brush I was using I cam back a couple of hours later to find it all dried up!

So, I wanted to ask if there is a nice, easy way to get this dried up paint off my brush without ruining the bristles too much.

The brush in question is the GW Small Flat Drybrush, any help is much appreciated, I want to finish painting my Monolith!

[Random Guy]

This has happened to me before. The brush is never quite the same as before but if you wash it out with hot (not boiling) water then you can get the worst of it out. You have to be quite rough with it otherwise you'll just get no-where. This works for me but the brush isn't to good for painting eyes with afterwards.

Random Guy

[templarboy]

You are better off saving the effort and just buying a new brush. Hot water will unseat the bristles and make the brush very funky. Bristles will point in interesting directions and will fall out. If you really want to try and save it, get some brush cleaner for acrylics and soak it for a few days. Random Guy is right though, it will never be the same.

[Lerra]

You could always use it as a drybrush afterwards.

If you really want to save it, use hair conditioner on the bristles after cleaning it. It'll make the point a lot better, although it probably won't be as good as it used to be.

[MaltonNecromancer]

I call pish-posh and piffle to the defeatist claims that the brush is done for! If it was a fine detail brush, then yes, but it's not! It's a drybrush, and those don't need to keep as tight a point.

To save this brush:

1.) Pour some dettol into a shot glass - about 5 mm of Dettol will do.
2.) Swirl the drybrush in the Dettol.
3.) Wearing latex gloves, pick at the dried paint.
4.) Repeat steps 1 - 3 until the paint is all gone.
5.) Rinse the brush with water.
6.) Wash the brush with a drop of shampoo.
7.) Rinse the brush with water.
8.) Wash the brush with a drop of hair conditioner.
9.) Rinse with water, then leave to dry.

Should work just fine as a drybrush after that. :)

[Duke Rich]

Cheers for all the advice guys! Just been washing it through with hot water and most of the dried up stuff's gone. But yeah, some of the bristles have gone off at angles so if I desperately need it for something other than drybrushing I could maybe cut those off.
However, I used it mostly as a drybrush/large areas on tanks brush, so it hopefully won't be too bad.
There are still a few stubborn bits so I shall give it a go tomorrow Malton, when I'm less tired :)

[MasterSlowPoke]

Hot water is terrible for brushes, always wash them in cold water. If it happens again, alternating between what you use to strip plastic models and brush cleaner worked for me when I accidentally stuck my brush in superglue and then a pot of water.

[BlackEnsign]

I found myself a local Hospice shop that sells small brushes for less than a tenth of the price of GW.

I have one GW fine detail brush that I use only on occasion when I have to. I have another, much smaller brush for things like eyes. After that, I simply use the cheapo equavalents. They don't hold their shape for as long as the GW counterparts, but at a 10:1 price ratio I can afford to replace them and always have spares.