Do your Pens flood as you paint with them? This is becasue the tip is blocked so the paint oozes out the side.
Or maybe your pen nib is dry and no paint comes out – it just needs hydrating! These issues and more can be resolved with the techniques we share here.
Lets chat how to clean your pen tips/ nibs.
Pen Dip
First you can try a pen dip, this will resolve a slight problem. In some clean water just dip your pen in for a few seconds and then take it out and scribble on your test rock to stimulate the nib.
Using a rock gives a hard surface that will not pick up any paper fibre from the wetness. Paper or paper towel when wiping a wet tip on it can grab and pick up some fibres. The first flow is watery but it comes good after a scribble. If this does not work, move on to the next method.
Clean the NIB
Using your fingers or a pair of tweezers pull out the nib/tip from the pen. You can do this with all pens except the Posca 1mr. All other brands we recommend have tips that are easily pulled out.
The medium size and above have a foam type tip and the extra fine smaller pens have a nylon type tip – this method works for both.
Place the tip in a clean glass of water. The required length of time depend on how dirty and blocked the tips are. you can try an hour or several hours.
Sometimes I just put them in water overnight while I am in bed. If you have several tips to do at once, grab an ice cube tray and put one tip in each area.
A lot of the paint in the tip will soak out in to the water. If you have a dried area it will of formed a small skin spot. You can wipe this on a microfibre cloth to get any gunk off the tip.
The tip still may have a touch of stained colour on it – that’s ok but for the most it will be the colour of the original new tip.
Place the tip back into the pen barrel. Then you can reset the pen like the photo below. It should now be working great.
DID YOU KNOW Mitsubishi Pencil ( The manufacturers of Posca Pens) have developed a unique valve mechanism that guarantees a perfect seal for the marker and conserves the paint over time. The same mechanism is used to prime the POSCA for use and to re-saturate the tip as often as necessary during creation. This also stops water from going back into the pen barrel if you dip your pens in water.
GRAB SOME POSCA PENS HERE
Click here – Australia
Click here – USA & other countries
Three brands that we recommend after much testing are
Posca Acrylic Paint Pens –
Click here – Australia
Click here – USA & other countries
Tooli-Art Acrylic Paint Pens –
Click here – Australia
Click Here – USA & other countries
Artistro – Acrylic Paint Pens –
Click here – Australia
Click Here – USA & other countries
SHOP HERE for the great products that we use on rocks. We have tested them over 30 day testing – from use to leaving outside in rain & sun.
If you need help with any of these products create a post on our Facebook group and we can help you troubleshoot. JOIN US HERE
Our Supplies page is HERE to read up on everything you need to paint Rocks.
Learn heaps of different techniques on how to paint rocks – Right HERE
We are adding new tutorials all the time CLICK HERE for heaps of new ideas
