One of the common situations that most of airbrush enthusiasts can run into at some point – dry paint in the airbrush.
Sometimes it’s not even visible, but a ring of dry paint can build-up by the needle packing seal. If you feel any resistance pulling the trigger back or pulling the needle out of the airbrush – dry paint is the most common reason. Forcing the needle out in this case will likely damage the needle seal. This will result in paint getting to the back section for the airbrush, where it should never be, likely get to airbrush air valve / trigger area and cause trigger to slip(in worse case damage seals in air valve). In other words, you don't want it to happen.
To prevent it, start by adding some of Createx 4008 restorer to your airbrush paint cup and let it sit for a while. It causes paint to lose it's adhesion. Dry paint will easily come off.
Unfortunately, that might not be enough. Area around the packing seal can be hard to reach/clean. If you can't pull the needle out without any resistance after cleaning with 4008 - do the following:
Take the needle out from the front of the airbrush.
In our case, on GSI Creos PS-771, we can simply remove the whole head assembly. Depends on the model of your airbrush, you might have to remove nozzle cap or hold down ring. Make nozzle/tip accessible so it can be removed.
Loosen the needle locknut and pull the needle out from the front.
Clean it well and re-install.
On some models, like Sotar 2020, needle can’t be pulled from the front. It can still be pushed forward and accessed from the paint cup section for cleaning.