Wasted $300 on a fancy paint gun that just sputtered and dripped the whole time

Bought a brand new Graco airless sprayer online after watching a bunch of hype videos, and it turned a 2-hour door job into a 6-hour mess of cleaning clogged tips and wiping runs off every panel, has anyone else had bad luck with those budget turbine units?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_nathan2d ago

That Graco you got probably isn't the "budget" unit people think it is. Most of those consumer-level airless sprayers actually use a simple turbine pump, not the pro-grade hydraulic pumps the YouTube guys are running. The real kicker is you gotta thin the paint A LOT more than the manual says - I learned that the hard way on a fence job. If you're spraying anything thicker than a light varnish, those $300 units just can't push the material through without sputtering and leaving drips. Try cutting your paint with Floetrol or even just a bit of water and see if it smooths out.

grant_ross272d ago

Man I gotta push back on that. Most of those budget Graco units actually do fine with unthinned paint if you keep the tip clean and don't run the pressure too low. I ran a whole deck with a $250 Magnum and it handled semi-solid stain straight out of the can no problem. People blame the machine when it's usually just a bad tip or not cleaning the filter.