Has anyone tried this?

Tools, Techniques, and Reference Materials Decaling
1

Has anyone ever tried applying dry transfer decals to decal paper, sealing and then applying them to a model? In theory it seems like it would work.

Any help would be apreciated.

Rocky

2

Hello!

The “Archer Dry Transfer” company recommends this approach, and I tried it too - it works, all right. I would just recommend sealing the decals after the “wet” application, not before - to allow for greater flexibility of the film at the time of application.

Hope it helps, have a nice day

Paweł

3

Interesting way to do…

4

I have often done this- it works fine. If the lettering goes down by itself okay, that is better because you do not see any decal film afterwards, but you can get rid of the visible decal film look with overcoat.

A nice thing about dry transfer lettering is that you can often put these down on flat paint without glossing the area. No carrier film to silver.

5

Thanks for the replies, so what you are saying is to not seal the dry transfer decals to the decal film as you would with a home printed decal? my fear is without sealing them prior to going into the water they may wash away?

I have very limited experience with dry transfers, mostly lettering box cars for my trains and have always had a problem keeping them straight and evenly spaced.

My current build requires custom nose art and as most printers dont print white, and I am not skilled enough to cut letters out of white decal film I thought white dry transfer letters on clear decal paper would solve my issue

6

The wax adhesive of dry transfers is reasonably water resistant. It is not super-strong, but strong enough that if you are not too rough with the resulting composite dry transfer on decal film, you will be all right without sealing.

This is not true of you make a decal with some dry transfer and some inkjet lettering or artwork. Then the inkjet artwork will dissolve immediately while the dry transfer will remain. If you need the dry transfer and inkjet artwork both, do them as seperate decals.

Indeed, the idea of an easier time lining up the dry transfer lettering, with ruler, etc. is the big advantage of applying the dry transfers to decal sheet rather than directly to the model. It is hard to hold the ruler to a curved model surface.