How do you keep decals from falling apart

[tgreco]

So I got the reissue of the Vulcan Shuttle Sarek as one of my christmas gifts, and if you're familiar with the kit, you know that it has dozens and dozens of decals

so I finished the painting, and started the decals, and with just the first few, the decals began falling apart in the water

is there any way to keep this from happening, or to strengthen the decals a bit?

 

[ralphee]

You could try microsol decal softener ive used it to good effect before. How long are you leaving the decal in water?
Smaller decals, i always pop in my mouth, tip from a very old school mentor, sadly, no longer with us, and no, it wasnt solvent poisoning!

Lee

 

[tgreco]

I'm leaving the decals in, just long enough to separate from the paper, in some instances they are coming off the paper broken. (so about a minute or so)

because the decals are meant to be transparent, I think they're just really thin.

One decal literally disintegrated in the water

 

[Sigma-LS]

Clearcoat your decal sheet. Sounds like whoever printed them didn't do it or didn't lay it on heavy enough so it's just ink on there that crumbles into pieces the second you try to work with them once they're off the backing.

I've run into this problem with custom printed stuff before...

 

[tgreco]

is it better to use gloss or flat clear coat?

 

[Sigma-LS]

Gloss would be better theoretically but I've never had a problem doing a quick pass with Testor's Dullcote when that's all I had laying around. Test it on something small first, like every technique that might backfire.:lol

 

[robn1]

Microscale liquid decal film. Brush it onto the decal before you put it in water.

And it's Surak

 

[tgreco]

... Spock's father... Spock's shuttle....Spock's philisophical mentor

it's all about the vowels

so if you use Microscale, do you let it dry? or just brush it on, and remove it from the backing paper?

 

[robn1]

Yes, let it dry. It's been a long time since I've used it, but I seem to recall it dries pretty fast. And it's made specifically to repair old cracked decals.

 

[tgreco]

does it make the decals harder to work with? (make them thicker or less flexible)

this thing is loaded with decals...

 

[robn1]

No it dries thin. The decals handle the same, they're just less likely to tear or fold over on themselves.

 

[tgreco]

cool

thanks robn

 

[Lord Boron]

I use microscale all the time and it works great. Just brush it on. Don't worry about brush strokes, because its self leveling and dries super thin. One word of advice, when I built the shuttle, I had one decade not work out. Luckily I had scanned the decal sheet on my PC so I was able to print a new one on clear decal film. Worked out well and you cant spot the replacement decal.

 

[tgreco]

Mad kudos to Round 2 for replacing the decal sheets, and mailing out the replacements so quickly.

Great customer service!

Hopefully there won't be any issues with these, and I can finish my Vulcan shuttle

 

[trekriffic]

I too recommend Microscale Liquid Decal Film. Just brush it on and wait 10 minutes and you should be good to go.