"Leon" wrote in message
...
I just finished helping a friend paint the interior of probably our 20th
house in the last 10 years. Typically he rolls on the latex to paint the
walls and I cut in. Also I do most of the oil based enamel trim painting.
Through the years he has always used thinner to thin the paint and to clean
the brushes. It has always been a pet peeve of mine to come back after
lunch and begin the trim work again. I always clean the brush in thinner
before leaving and when I resume painting the residual thinner in the brush
blends with the paint in the brush and runs down the handle for the next
hour. I HATE THAT! And It never starts immediately, it begins 15 minutes
after thinking I am starting with a "basically dry" brush. I often will
prime the brush with a very small bit of thinner but what resides after
cleaning is way way more than "a bit".

This time around he brought mineral spirits, odorless AAMOF.

I noticed,

1. No odor, although Swingman would testify that is smells like a
refinery 13.6 miles NE of Pasadena, TX had just released .003 atoms of
smelly stuff into the atmosphere about 15 minutes prior. ;~)

2. It works just as well as thinner for cleaning the brushes.

3. I never once had a friggin dripping brush after lunch.

Does mineral spirits evaporate faster than thinner?

Seems unreasonable given that paint thinner is primarily if not entirely
mineral spirits. This information is based on the various cans I've looked
at over the years...

Try wrapping the paint wet brush in plastic wrap during lunch rather than
cleaning the brush. --OR-- Spin the brush to get rid of the fluid trapped in
the heel and then dry well with paper towels and wrap the brush in newspaper
to absorb fluid during lunch. It helps to suspend the brush by the handle,
bristles down so that gravity helps the fluid migrate out of the heel.

John