My first tip would be to make your own mop and mop paint. It's not hard to do and you will get a lot more for significantly less. Deoderant , water bottle , sunscreen bottle, glue bottles, air freshener refills, etc. There are no limits to what you can do as far as making mops go, and you should have enerything in your house right now. Making the paint or ink you choose is easy too, but it may require you to spend a little. Go look on youtube. Once you get the hang of it, you'll never pay stupid money for a tag again.

 

My next tip would be to buy a wide nibbed mop if you do buy one. These nibs are easier to repair. If your nib tears or is just worn to hell, you can get a 12cent sheet of flet at walmart and replace the fabric on the nib. I couldn't find any videos on this and I only found 1 other person that does this but it will make your mop last FOREVER. Iv'e had the same montana crusher for years and years. Instructions:
Remove all of the material from the worn nib. You will have to get something to dig it out from under the edges of the nib ring. Once you get everything out from under that ring your gonna want to clean it just with a paper towel or something. Next cut a piece of felt about 2mm larger than the diameter of the nib so you can tuck it in tight. Put a little fabric glue all around inside that little ring and begin tucking that felt into place with some tweezers or a pin. Let it dry overnight without the cap on and your good to go. It should last as long as a real nib if you do it right.

 

If you paint with hardwear store paint and dont have access to caps and adapters, rack your own female caps.
Caps to Use on Male Cans/Where to Find Them
Discussion in 'Tools and tips'

 

Color Place fills, Rusto outlines.
Color Place tags.

 

Sketch in chalk. You can get much cleaner sketches and you can erase it.

 

For Begginers, because I know how hard choosing caps can be:
Experimenting with caps can be unreasonably complicated and expensive. There's often nowhere you can buy just 1 cap for 25c and even if there is, there will always be caps you wanna try that they don't have. Here is how I finally chose mine.

Be realistic. Your a bigginer so you aren't gonna be painting with fancy european cans. This means you have to choose caps that are compatible with your male valve hardwear store paints. Don't bother with female caps unless your getting them for free. Instead get yourself 4mm and 3.2mm adapters so you can use the caps meant for art.

Now you can begin to look at caps. Since you have to use an adapter to paint, you have to get caps that will work just as well when adapted. This is where we turn to the OG caps. These caps are born and bred for use on hardwear store paints. They include the NY Fat, NY Outline, Rusto Fat, and Lego Hybrid. These are your best friends when your starting and even so as you progress. These caps set the standard for ALL spray caps. Do thorough research on these and get yourself the "Local Paint Pack" from the BScience Store. Once you've found which ones work best for you from those, then stick with them. I've been painting for a long time and some of the only caps I use are the OG caps.

As you become quainted to these caps continue to do your research on caps that will work well with an adapter and see which other ones might be of intrest to you. Narrow yourself down to 3 or 4 main caps and learn everything about them. A fat, A thin, a super fat or super thin, and something funky.

I personally use an NY Fat, Lego Hybrid, CMC Jiffy, and a Pink Dot. And since this is a baller on a budget page, heres another important thing. YOU DONT NEED 100 OF EACH CAP. Blow air through your cap as soon as your done with it and they won't clog. If they do then throw it in a jar with Acetone or Paint Thinner. Let it sit for a few days to a week shaking it and theyr'e usually good as new. I have the same 20 something NY Fats I ordered maybe 3 years ago. Maybe even invest in some clog resistant caps.(They are out there) Happy Sprays