Why Every Painter Should Use Reversible Tips

Getting the right Graco spray tip for your gun is essential to producing the high-quality finish your project requires. The spray tip not only controls the amount of fluid that exits the gun when the trigger is pulled, but it also controls the width of the spray fan the gun produces.

Use These Tips To Select The Correct Tip For Your Spray Project:

Select a spray tip whose orifice size is rated for the paint or coating you intend to apply. Larger spray tips are needed for heavy coatings like texture, whereas smaller tips are needed for lighter coatings like lacquers, stains, and enamels. Spray tip sizes that are suggested are often listed on product specification sheets or paint containers by manufacturers.

Ascertain the spray tip size based on your sprayer’s tip grade. Verify that the sprayer is capable of holding the tip you intend to use. Select a tip size that corresponds with your sprayer’s multiple gun tip rating if you want to use multiple spray guns on the job.

Pick A Tip: Recognise The Numbers

The majority of spray tips have a three-digit code on them. The width of the fan the tip will produce when sprayed at a distance of 12 inches from the surface is indicated by multiplying the first number by two. The second two figures represent the spray tip’s orifice size in thousandths of an inch, which controls the amount of fluid that exits the tip. A 515 tip, for instance, has an aperture of 15 thousandths of an inch and can spray a fan that is 10 inches wide. The amount of coating that you spray depends on the combination of fan width and orifice size.

As an illustration, consider the orifice size of a 317 and a 517 tip, which are both 17 thousandths of an inch. However, whereas the 317 tip sprays a 6-inch-wide fan, the 517 tip sprays a 10-inch-wide fan. The reversible tips will produce a thinner coating with a lower mil build since the same quantity of paint is exiting the spray tip’s orifice but is spread over a larger fan.

To Determine The Types Of Tips, Graco Employs A Colour-coding System

• Blue or black are the general use tips.
• Green tips with a fine finish
• Tips with low pressure are neon.
• The color yellow indicates field marking or pavement striping tips.
• Heavy-duty, high-pressure tips are used for thick coatings and textures.

Worn Tips Expense Money and Time

All spray tips will wear with regular usage, even though Graco tips are composed of the best quality tungsten carbide, the most abrasion-resistant material available. All coatings contain some amount of abrasive materials, but not all of them. Because of the rise in tip orifice size and decrease in fan breadth that occurs with tip wear, using a worn tip can result in hundreds of dollars worth of lost paint and labor. This results in more overspray, more labor, more passes to cover the surface, and significant paint waste.

Assume, for instance, that a contractor charges $25 per hour for labor, paint costs $15 per gallon, and the contractor can spray five gallons of paint in an hour. The contractor will waste an additional $36.25 in paint and labor each hour if he utilizes a worn tip, which is a 12-inch fan design worn to a 9-inch. The painter will spend almost $300 a day if he keeps using the worn tip!

Reverse-A-Clean Tips

As much as possible, always reduce the pressure while maintaining a proper spray pattern. In addition to saving paint by minimizing overspray, this also lowers tip wear and extends pump life, which saves you money. A Graco spray tip designed especially for your application is available. Knowing your options for airless tips will help you select the Graco spray tip that best suits your requirements.

The most adaptable reversible tips available are clean tips, often known as tr1 tips. They can be used for a wide range of coatings and come in around 200 sizes. Reversible tips make it simple to remove blockages from tips by simply rotating them 180 degrees to the clean position and then activating the sprayer. Furthermore, the tip guard and housing of RAC tips can be easily replaced without having to be removed because of their unique design.

Conclusion

Heavy coatings that need higher pressures to atomize are the intended application for Graco’s XHD RAC SwitchTips. Their large grey handle, which makes it simple to rotate even when very thick coatings like elastomeric and texturing are present, serves as a distinguishing feature.

Regardless of the spraying application, Graco has a tip that is precisely tailored to do the task with the highest professional quality finish, having led the industry in fluid applications for many years. They provide a 24-inch fan pattern that is extra-wide, enabling you to spray twice as much area as a typical tip. For these tips to provide a thick enough mil build to cover such a big area in a single pass, a larger orifice size is necessary.